Tricycle: Not Interested in Twitter Buddhists?
“Don’t push your wisdom onto others; it doesn’t work.” ~ Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche
The morning after my second angioplasty the cardiologist told me there was nothing more that could be done for me.
From that moment my life became like a dream, the kind in which whatever I do is futile; yet I give it my best shot anyway.
That’s what Milarepa did when Marpa refused to teach him and made him build tower after tower instead. He knew it was futile, yet he did it all the same.
My friend Tyler Dewar (@TylerDewar on Twitter) tweeted me to chill. Waylon implored me to be nice to Tricycle magazine. They care about me.
If Tricycle doesn’t want to follow people back on Twitter there is nothing I can do about it. They are Tricycle and I am nobody to them.
But to quote Tyler on Chandrakirti, “He didn’t leave the spice in the cupboard, either.” The same can be said for me; I never leave the spice in the cupboard, either.
If you don’t follow me on Twitter, I’ve been up in Tricycle’s grill all week. It took some arm twisting but I finally got up the corporate ladder to its Web editor.
At this point my boss wants me to say that these are my views and not those of Elephant Journal or its publisher. This is just me being me.
Also, I would appreciate it if you would let Tricycle magazine’s phil@tricycle.com know what you think. Perhaps it is just me.
Don’t bother trying to direct message them on Twitter. They don’t follow back, which makes tweeting with them all but impossible.
As Web editor, Philip Ryan instead has decided to focus on pushing links to Tricycle magazine content. If people don’t like it, that’s their problem.
I believe, as Khenchen Thrangu Rinpoche teaches, “At any point we can always understand,” so I tried my best to change his mind but failed.
My view of the matter is of someone dedicated to the path of reason in Buddhism, as taught by Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche.
Nothing is permanent, singular and independent, whether we are talking about self-existence, or an antisocial Web editor.
I tried to convince Tricycle that it was playing with fire. I may be only a single spark, but that’s all it takes to get burned in social media.
All I got for my efforts was contempt of course, as people on Twitter told me I would from the very beginning of my little exercise in futility.
When you don’t follow back, unfollow and block people on Twitter, you build up a lot of ill will toward your brand.
There’s a lot of contempt on Twitter for Tricycle. I’ve heard from many, many people who really despise the magazine. And Tricycle has earned that bad rap.
Despite being a columnist for Elephant Journal, and the benefit of its publisher’s connections, it was all but impossible to get even a comment for my column.
I never imagined that it would take so much out of me. By Friday morning I could feel my heart fluttering irregularly. I thought my defibrillator was going to go off.
Waylon suggested that I write a social media manifesto for Twitter Buddhists. I’m too pooped out for something so ambitious.
I simply would like Tricycle to consider a more enlightened approach when it comes to following back, unfollowing and blocking people on Twitter.
I’m not interested in fighting a fight I can’t win; although certainly I had no idea it would turn out to be such a major production. I get that they want to focus on content over participation.
For example, pushing links to breaking Web content works for the New York Times. So if Tricycle thinks it might work for their publication, more power to them.
I set out to confirm with Tricycle that it isn’t interested in Twitter Buddhists. And according to Tricyle’s Web editor Philip Ryan, this is so. My work is done.
As Milarepa sang, “Delusion as wisdom, now that’s being cheerful and bright, delusion transformed into wisdom, now that’s all right!”
Success and failure are equally empty of self-existence. It’s a lesson worth repeating. Sometimes you just have to do what you have to do.
Someone who agrees with Tricycle called me deluded. I took it as a compliment. All relative truth is nothing but self-delusion.
I want one thing; someone else wants something else. Both are equally empty of self- existence. Approaching any disagreement in terms of right and wrong is irrelevant.
I’ll gladly concede the point. I still will argue my point. As Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche teaches, “Letting go is not giving up.”
I have to run now. The Blackhawks just went up 2–0 against the Flyers in the Stanley Cup. And Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche just sent me a direct message via Twitter.
I laugh when people suggest I feel put out by not being followed by Tricycle on Twitter. And these same people think I’m deluded. Give me a break.
Later.
Karmapa Chenno
(Follow me on Twitter @Ryderjaphy)
Incorrect source, offensive, or found a typo? Or do you want to write for Elephant?
Great post. I didn't actually intend for you to say "elephant journal doesn't take responsibility for this content…the views are of the author and his responsibility alone." That's the kind of corporate BS we see at the top of DVDs.
I simply wanted you to express your views. That you have done, I think quite gently and precisely. I'm frankly pleasantly surprised as how mild your above post is—a war with Tricycle, which I like and respect and have read since I was a boy at KCL in Vermont—is not something that I think would be of benefit for anyone.
That said, I think you're an awesome, personal wielder of the twitter sword—and perhaps this post will have the intended, or otherwise, effect of encouraging Trike (and the Sun) to use twitter more, and more effectively. And that, of course, will be of benefit to all.
Generosity (in twitter verbiage, following back) is the virtue that produces peace.
Ki ki, so so
~ Waylon
What exactly did the Tricycle web editor say?
Waylon,
After my wife read Philip Ryan's email to me in response to my queries, as you have too, as an editor herself she found him unprofessional. I defended him. I really pushed his buttons last week.
I'm not interested in telling Tricycle how to tweet as much as pointing out what they are missing by not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter.
I did my job. I spoke truth to power. It's a relative truth though. Reasonable people may disagree with me. Hopefully, Tricycle will take my critique in the spirit it has been given.
I'm not a Tricycle hater. I've always considered it as the Better Home and Garden magazine of Buddhism. It's not a magazine that I have ever subscribed to but one that when bought I never throw out.
On the other hand, Philip Ryan is a piece of work. He isn't serving his brand well on Twitter with his anti-social behavior in my opinion. I may well be wrong. Right and wrong lack self-existence though.
Bill
kudos brother bill~~ a foundation of buddhism is sangha. the communication has to go both ways and every One has to be respected. i appreciate your in Sight. peace
Richard,
All credit to Waylon Lewis, and Elephant Journal. The people at Tricycle are his people. He hasn't made any friends there. He put it on the line for this column.
I've always held a low opinion of dharma brats, the children of dharma practitioners. They lack the brass of their parents back in the day, the generation that established the dharma in the West.
I'm biased of course, being a baby boomer. I'm impressed how Waylon stuck his neck out on this column. All I did was stick my boot up Philip Ryan's ass after Waylon did all the heavy lifting.
I wrote two emails, and posted my thoughts on the experience. It hardly merits mention. I'm an old bastard of a Buddhist who will gladly stick his size 12 shoe where the sun doesn't shine if called upon.
When it comes to speaking truth to power, I can't resist lacing up my combat boots. I've always been like that.I've always been a handful when it comes to authority.
As a small child in school, one of my earliest memories was giving the bus driver the finger. I didn't even know what it means. I must have seen some kid flip someone off.
I have severe congestive heart failure and you could knock me on my ass with a feather but the other day we were driving and I gave someone the finger.It was a matter of principle.
I just hung my tattooed arm out the window and aired out the bird for them like I meant it. I didn't of course mean it. Dzogchen Polop Rinpoche calls it the American Mudra.
I'm trying to convince Waylon to keep the pressure up on Tricycle. He featured it for 24 hours, which I appreciate of course, but it is now off the front page.
This is my issue with the dharma brat generation. They were born into the dharma. I want to finish what I started. We are at 500 views on our second day. This is our only leverage.
I know he believes in the power of Web 2.0 to speak truth to powerful interests. We have such a powerful interest in Tricycle magazine with their feet to the fire.
There is no excuse for their not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people. If it isn't a two way street it is yesterday's media where the line between contributor and audience is black and white.
For Tricycle there is no return on investment in blurring the line between content provider and consumer. They could automate there tweets and nobody would notice.
If you are the New York Times with breaking news stories this RSS feed aproach to Twitter may provide you a return on your investment. Tricycle magazine isn't the New York Times.
It's yesterday's news before it goes to the printer. They re-purpose old content or content from the catalog of Buddhist publishing houses.
That's why I have copies of Tricycle around my house from the 1990's because it's always good content. Lama Surya Das gets older in his ads since 1990 but not much has changed over the years.
The foundation of Buddhism is Sangha. Tricycle doesn't consider Twitter Buddhists sangha but web traffic to their online content. I'm glad to see you on this side of the fight.
Bill
Well, you earned it, this Dharma Brat has been convinced to put your post where it belongs, click-wise: in our Popular section near the top of <a linkindex="570" href="http://www.elephantjournal.com" target="_blank"> <a href="http://;http://www.elephantjournal.com” target=”_blank”>;http://www.elephantjournal.com , where, posts generally live for about a week.
What a bore. Did I really just read a whole column about a magazine screwing up with their twitter account?
I just read a unpublished teaching of Dilgo Kyentse Rinpoche that was one of the most powerful Buddhist teachings I have ever read in Tricycle. My partner and I just gave aid to disabled Nepalese children and to nuns in Taiwan that recycle trash in to aid for Haiti and would ever have heard of these groups if it was not for Tricycle. Even Ryder Japhys own name comes from On The Roads character Japhy Ryder based on the real life Gary Snyder who just published an article…………in Tricycle.
Thank you Ryder Japhy for letting us know the people at Tricycle are busy working hard on their fantastic magazine and not "tweeting" all day with people. Perhaps you could learn a thing or two from them about quality control.
sincerely,
a Tricycle reader
I'm a longtime fan of Tricycle, too. Thanks for defending them.
That said, social media may be distracting, but it's not a distraction. It's communication. Social media has saved our business—established elephant nationally, quickly—brought us readers from Canada, Ireland, Australia, even India…that can be hard to do as a physical magazine, distribution-wise, which elephant once was.
Thank you, TricycleReader! We do our best.
Tricycle Reader,
I was told that Philip likes to game the web like this. I have copies of Tricycle scattered throughout my home going back to the 1990's. I can't bring myself to toss them out.
Good thing Tricycle publishes so many pictures. It's a shame you don't know how to read. Then again you are a message board troll and don't have to read.
If you and Philip would like to address the original query you are welcome to: Be warned that I eat internet trolls for breakfast. There's a reason why they don't post comments to my column.
Again, answer the question. Philip may want to hide behind this prestigious employer's reputation, which I can't blame him. Tricycle magazine is awesome.
I asked Philip to clarify his position as web editor on the subject of not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter.
He responded that he has chosen to focus on pushing links to Tricycle's wonderful content. Apparently, Philip never learned to read either. I wasn't asking about his tweet stream.
I could have asked this very same question of Shambhala Times and would have been able to speak with their web editor and have gotten a professional response.
Instead I happened to have chosen Tricycle for my little experiment.Philip has made a lot of enemies for his brand as web editor.I expected him to respond like a publishing professional.
It was an incredible experience for me. I write a weekly column about my experiences. I have a small audience of readers. I have no idea what I will write about next.
I can assure you that it won't be what I wrote about this week. Like Chandrakirti, I won't leave the spice in the cupboard, either. Like it or not, it will be real.
I had a nice chat earlier with the person that handles the Budhism_Now Twitter account. It's a touchy subject. They don't follow back either, but are very social on Twitter unlike Tricycle.
I've been online long enough to not fall for Philip's little comment game you are playing with Tricycle. Nice try though. Fortunately, someone on Twitter gave me the heads up.
Bill
An old quote that seems to have some relevancy:
"Not bad for someone widely regarded as a fraud here by Buddhists since 2006 when I first started this message board.
Ironically if not for the viscous response I received from MySpace Buddhists which forced me off of MySpace my current success online would never have happened.
It was a truly horrible experience for me to hounded off of MySpace in the name of the dharma by MySpace Buddhists but I never gave up."
Perhaps this is another lesson?
Oh, and while I'm at it, you're welcome for the MySpace experience. May you always have what you need to be.
~Fenix~
Take care of your health Bill.
Dear Bill,
I do not know you. I pray your health is good and that you live a long and productive life.
I have just woken up from a nap and still a little groggy but with the freshness which might be equivalent to the exhileration one feels when one drunk dials and says those things which at the time make so much sense(to one's self). I have read your column regarding Buddhism and I understand, the best I can, your general thesis. I have read articles by other authors regarding Buddhism and Yoga and the mingling of the two and so on. I am not a reader of any Buddhist Magazines and do not partake in any Blogs with Buddhist chatting. I have received some teaching.
I really want to say…"stop this"..take care of yourself and prepare for death.
Padma Kadag,
If you have been following along you would know that my heart has stopped twice over the past year. I have a defibrillator implanted in my chest. I call it sparky.
I have also received final instructions for dying from my guru, Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche, last fall. He told me to be prepared to be terrified. I haven't worried about dying since.
I have both Tyler Dewar, the 17th Karmapa's translator, and Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, a direct message away anytime I need them, as well as my many friends on Twitter.
I've also completed over four million mani recitations since the end of of last September. I appreciate your concern, but I'm good. I've faced death twice and I'm more than ready to chill with Amitabha.
This is nothing. Like the 16th Karmapa used to say, "Nothing Happens." It's a terrifying place to be, but fortunately, we can be prepared for it. That's what dying is was like for me.
Like I said when they stopped my heart to test my defibrillator, "awesome;" a truly unforgettable experience. Thanks for the comment, but I don't understand what exactly you want me to stop unfortunately.
I'm doing a job here. This column is a front page feature on Elephant Journal. I wish I could repeat whatever I have done in this column on a weekly basis.
I can't work of course. I can barely walk four blocks. I'm having the time of my life writing for Elephant Journal. It beats sleeping all day and waiting for "Sparky" to kick my ass again. This is fun.
Bill Schwartz
notice how Ryder Japhy doesn't want Phil Ryan to post the whole conversation, hmmmmmm. suspect
this digressed from "smoking gun" to "my wife thinks"
Congradulations RJ, you've successfully redefined the popcorn fart
John,
My friend, the late Gingerman bouncer, Bobby Scarpelli, taught me to be gentle when letting someone know who is in charge. Sometimes all it takes is a twist of the thumb. It's not about who has the biggest dick.
I have a nice grip on Philip Ryan's thumb about now. If he thinks posting here our email exchange has anything to do with his not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter he has my permission to do so.
I've asked Waylon to permit him to include his 10 emails on my behalf to Tricycle. I would love to see a time line included so that people can appreciate how unresponsive Tricycle is to a simple question.
For my part, all I have to do is smile. And keep the pressure up. Philip has decided he wants to suddenly clarify his position on not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter.
I eagerly await his clarification. I'm sure Waylon would gladly publish it on Elephant Journal. And he's more than welcome to explain himself here. I'm all ears.
Regarding my wife, she has been in book publishing over thirty years, and if she tells me an email response is unprofessional, that's good enough for me.
Lastly, I tried to find you online but I can't seem to find a "John Starks" that you could possibly be. I was kind of hoping you were someone, given you're big talk. Unfortunately, you are just talk and no action.
That's all you got, "popcorn fart"? My eight year old grandson could do better than that. Read the comments and weep. Nobody supports Philip's position on not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter.
See John, with web 2.0, all it takes is a tiny bit of leverage with a brand, in this case, Tricycle, to get their attention. All you have to do is smile and keep the pressure up.
Bill
As always the meat of your post is in the comments, yours specially.
I believe not Twitter-following your customers is bad business, because it means you are not willing to listen to them. Precisely the new value for business of social media sites like Twitter, is the possibility to pay attention to your customers so your product can improve and sell even more. Tricycle apparently does not understand that and choses to use Twitter as one way street. Then comes a guy like you, a lifelong American Buddhist pioneer, who talks his brains out, and puts them to shame. Only they still don't get it, they have a board meeting and decide the whole thing did not explode on their faces. It did.
David and Goliat reloaded.
Tashi Delek
Clara,
Sorry for the delay Clara. I've been sleeping a lot. The summer heat and humidity has begun here in Chicago. After initially pushing back Philip Ryan has wisely chosen to step back from his little mess.
Also noteworthy, Elephant Journal has decided to take the pressure off. Instead of keeping this column featured on the front page it is now in the archive.
It was an interesting experience though. For me it was just another column, another week in my life. It was an unpleasant one, but I've had much more unpleasant ones over the past year.
Ironically, the unpleasant ones tend to be the most memorable. As expected, I have accomplished nothing. It was a great little amusement park of a ride.
If we were able to keep the pressure up, perhaps we could have accomplished something positive. Off the front page, Philip finally realizing he can't win this issue, the ride is over.
Tricycle will not give it a second thought. We had their attention there for a moment, which was more than most people on Twitter thought possible. They aren't interested in Twitter Buddhists.
Although a not-for-profit they don't have the ethos we associate with a not-for-profit. Although a Buddhist magazine they don't act like Buddhists when presented with an obstacle.
Instead they act like a for-profit corporation. They see no return on their investment in dedicating themselves to Twitter Buddhists. It's a better ROI to push market links to re-purposed print content. Most important, they don't care.
They are Tricycle. As publishers they know their formula for success and as business people they are more than content to run it into the ground.
They have the publishers of Buddhist titles, the authors of Buddhist books, the advertisers who are also the publishers, which is all they really need.
If you can re-purpose content like Tricycle can, slap a pretty picture on it, and people will buy it you're golden these days. This is the publishing industry these days.
You throw as much crap on the wall as possible and see what sticks. If it sticks you throw more of it against the wall. They have so removed themselves from Buddhists we don't matter to Tricycle anymore.
They are in the Buddhism business. If you are an "A" list Buddhist with a book coming out their door is always open at the Tricycle office.If not, forget you.
Even Waylon as publisher of Elephant journal had to email them 10 times to just get their attention. Finally, I told him to give me his contact info. All it took was one email from me to get a response.
Unlike Waylon who considers Tricycle to be a friend I simply wanted a comment. I got what I set out. We already know they don't follow back, unfollow, and block people on Twitter.
This is a statement of fact. I needed confirmation that this isn't a mere oversight but official policy of Tricycle. Philip Ryan provided me with that. My job was done.
The fact that he was so unprofessional and thought he could push back here of all places was a gift that just kept on giving while it lasted. Fortunately for Tricycle, we won't be hearing from Philip here again.
My one disappointment is that Waylon isn't keeping the pressure up by keeping this column on the front page. It's a minor disappointment though. I have my next column to concern myself with.
Bill
Again, it is featured on the front page, because it's popular. It's in our Popular section. Bill has acknowledged this in other comments, but he's not always able to update or add new comments due to his health, which we allllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll hope he takes good care of. We want him around making trouble for years to come.
And, again, I didn't have to email Tricycle 10 times. I was complaining to Bill, apparently, unclearly, that this whole episode was taking up a lot of my limited time (we have next to no staff hours), and that Tricycle and I have been emailing back and forth 10 times. I wasn't clear, apparently. In any case, Tricycle has been very responsive and eager to handle this criticism in a constructive way, and I'm glad we can all be open and okay about this, here.
It's a sign of maturity that the Buddhist media and sangha can relate to one another like this, perhaps.
Odd, this guy Ryderjaphy never followed me on Twitter when I followed him. So, what's the big deal?
Peace.
Meditator,
My name is Bill Schwartz, my handle is on Twitter is "RyderJaphy" and people call me Bill. It's a distinction worth noting, if you are a dharma practitioner.
It's called discriminating wisdom in Buddhism. In the world of post-meditation it is called being polite. I know, you were trying to be sarcastic. I'm in stitches.
I love it when people that don't know me post comments like yours. It's kind of stupid, if you think about it. You post a comment. I get to respond. You can't win, and I can't lose.
Even better, my comment count goes up, and I don't even have to do anything. Thank you. I respond to every comment. Usually, the comments are thought provoking.
I really have to think about how I respond. You didn't even read the column. You must be a Tricycle reader. It's right up your alley. Lots of pictures and ads and old content everyone has read before.
You can leave it on your coffee table. People will think you are a Buddhist when they visit. They will be impressed by the pictures, the ads, and all the old content which will be new to them.
I love Tricycle. You really don't have to read it. All you have to do is buy and leave it out. Occasionally, I flip through it. I like the pictures too.
I've read most of the books that they excerpt and repurpose as content. For the well read dharma practitioner there isn't a lot to sink your teeth into.
Fortunately, their core readership doesn't actually read. They are consumers, which explains perhaps, despite it being bad Buddhism, and bad business, they don't follow back, unfollow, and block people on Twitter.
They know their audience. Twitter Buddhists tend to be very well read readers of dharma. They tend to be longtime dharma practitioners. Unfortunately for Tricycle, they aren't passive consumers of McBuddhism.
I started out in 2006 on MySpace and encountered a lot of amateurs like yourself and became quite adept at chewing up them up and spitting them out.
Before my heart attack I could respond to 30-50 comments an hour. Most of them were like yours, little passive-aggressive drive by shootings on the information highway.
Here on Elephant Journal, as a columnists, on a good day I can respond to 3-5 comments a day. People who read my column actually know how to read.
If you would like me to follow you on Twitter and I somehow missed you. It's very simple. Tweet me @RyderJaphy and I will respond to your tweet and follow you back.
Too complicated? I post at least one dharma quote a day. I use the hashtag #emaho so they are easy to find. Search for the hashtag. Use the retweet button to retweet it. Even a moron like you can do it.
Bill
I would add, what's your twitter handle, Meditator, so that Mr. Bill Schwartz, @Ryderjaphy, could follow you back?
Yeah you're real professional and a practicing Buddhist calling people morons.
"I started out in 2006 on MySpace and encountered a lot of amateurs like yourself and became quite adept at chewing up them up and spitting them out." –and you're proud of chewing people up and spitting them out?
Funny how you have to take up some much room with all your fluff to respond to a single-line comment.
Uhhhh…. dude with too much free time is unfollowed on Twitter, makes (boring) federal case about it. What a snooze. how do you know who blocks you on twitter? Why dont' you write Bills' Rules of Twitter and get it over with? Tricycle sucks too (never read it.)
Pete,
I don't agree that Tricycle sucks. I would gladly write a book of Twitter rules. I have severe congestive heart failure so I can't work and could use the money.
I'm sorry that my column bores you. Enough people enjoy it fortunately. It breaks up my periods of sleeping and not being able to sleep as I slowly die in increments.
Long before I became a columnist I was named last year a Buddhist to follow on Twitter by William Harryman and since then I haven't had to worry about who follows me.
My biggest concern on Twitter is making sure I follow people back. It takes time to separate out the auto-follow programs from real people on Twitter.
You have to admit it made a killer column whether you enjoyed it or not. At this moment Tricycle is on the defensive. They are trying to defend themselves by blaming an overwhelmed employee.
He or she couldn't deal with following 380 people on Twitter. Contrast this with Elephant Journal which follows 16,162 people on Twitter while publishing more new content online in a day than they do in a month.
If you want a more exciting column of mine you can read my column on being awake when they inserted a defibrillator for my heart. It wasn't as popular as this column though.
It's only Thursday and it has had 685 views and is featured on the front page of Elephant Journal. Tricycle is reviewing their policy of not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter.
I can't even keep up with the comments. That's for health reasons though. Generating 48 comments since posting the column Tuesday isn't a bad response so far.
I wish I had more free time. Every effort costs me cardiac output, gas from my gas tank. No more free ride for me. Getting up in Tricycle's grill has cost me physically.
As a matter of principle though, I consider it time well spent. Especially, if Tricycle reverses their policy regarding Twitter. It would be good for Tricycle, good for Twitter, and good for the dharma online; not bad for a single column.
Bill
Bill, you and I have discussed this on twitter and I told you my experience with Tricycle. They didn’t unfollow me, they blocked me.
I’m new to Buddhism and in a very strong learning phase. I follow lots of Buddhist tweeps (via blog, FB, twitter, etc)
I understand the unfollow thing – a person is saying I don’t want to read your tweets but it’s ok if you check out mine. People do this all the time, I do this too.
Blocking someone, is much stronger. When someone blocks you, as I’m sure you know, you can’t see their tweets.
I do understand that many people want to keep their tweets private, between themselves and their closer friends only. But when a Buddhist magazine does that, it’s … well, weird.
Why don’t they want me to read/learn from what they are posting?
As a result of this, Im reluctant to read anything else that comes from them because their blocking of me … it just makes me wonder.
How a person behaves on twitter is important. Imo, it is an extension of one’s character.
P.S. treating people like this (whether in person, by email, twitter, phone, snailmail etc) is just plain bad business. When you make a reader happy, they tell 10 friends. When you piss of a reader, they tell 75 friends (who tell 75 other friends) and you get a bad reputation.
Bill I think you’re onto something here. Thanks for calling our attention to this.
That's exactly it, I think Carol Ann. As Bill said, this was not about him being personally offended by being unfollowed by Tricycle. It's about them not showing the guy a little respect and courtesy and explaining their Twitter "policy" regarding following, unfollowing, blocking, etc.
To be honest, I don't even get how following works… If you follow someone, do their posts show up in your Twitter stream or what?
[...] after we made the cuts, an Elephant Journal columnist who had been unfollowed took umbrage and began broadcasting his displeasure via Twitter, Twitter [...]
One-way traffic flow on Twitter is a widely accepted practice. The NYTimes account follows a mere 190 people http://twitter.com/nytimes. Providing well-curated content, listening and following a handful of influencers within your realm is common.
The beauty of Twitter? If you don't find what you want with one entity you're following, unfollow. Like the energy of the web, keep moving forward.
Gwen,
Thanks for the sanity! Tricycle doesn't follow me, but I still love the zine. I also can't help but wonder if the NY Times would go bankrupt from legal fees if they engaged in the kind of Twitter discussion that some are suggesting here.
Gwen, this is rare, but I'd disagree with your choice of words, here. Not following back is frequent, but not accepted. Twitter is like ping pong–you can only have fun if you give and take, both. Lots of celebs or politicos don't follow back, much—SarahPalinUSA only follows maybe 80 people, all people she agrees with already (like O'Reilly or Hannity…). That's not the way to learn from and enjoy twitter—thought of course you can get away with it if you're famous.
@DeepakChopra might be a better example of using twitter. The guy's on it all the time, sharing quotes, responding directly to attacks or complements…same with @WholeFoods, which empowered one lady to use her authentic voice instead of a corporate voice, and won best company on twitter via the Shorty Awards (@elephantjournal won best twitter in #green, which helped to save our business).
If I were Tricycle or Shambhala Sun, and I'm not, and it's none of my business…but my advice would be to follow all popular and active Buddhist tweeters.
I'll reply in a blog post as soon as I can, Way. My take on this is partially captured in Digital Downsizing: http://www.gwenbell.com/blog/2010/1/13/digital-do… & I think a Twitter-specific post will help flesh it out a bit.
So much anger. All these emotions do not solve anything and do not benefit anyone.
I do not choose for other people who they may and may not follow on social networking sites. Other people do not choose for me who I may and may not follow. We are all free to choose.
Pema Chodron has written some wonderful books on anger. She once said “If we learn to open our hearts, anyone, including the people who drive us crazy, can be our teacher.”
Rob,
I thought I had missed at least one comment. Glad I checked. I'm listening to Muddy Waters "Goin' Down Slow;" I'd like to hear more about this angry person you are talking about.
He sounds like a real asshole. He should take two Pema Chodren CDs and book a weekend at Omega Institute and do a complete spiritual spa treatment.
I wrote the column you have commented on. I don't know who or what you are talking about. You might try to actually read the column. Just a suggestion.
I assure you all the piss was edited out. You should have read the unedited first draft. I don't ever recall being angry though. I may have been angry for a moment. I'll cop to a flash.
Thursday afternoon a friend called and we spent the day just hanging out and talk about his painting, and the creative process. I just had to get away from it all.
Whatever anger I may have swallowed it was all sweet nectar by Friday afternoon. All I had to do was chill over the weekend and type it out Monday. It takes a lot to actually get angry.
The closest I came was after I found out I was dying. I was livid. I couldn't believe it. Then once I dealt with it myself I had to deal with everyone that couldn't believe I was dying. I was fit to be tied for months.
So, I believe I know what anger feels like, and I can assure you I wasn't angry. I was excited, as was Elephant Journal. We we're all pretty psyched over what had happened.
Waylon was right, it was a huge success. And it was my unlucky 13th for Elephant Journal too. I'm now America's Baddest Buddhist. Just ask Tricycle Journal.
Talk about, "Hello! We are here!" It must have came as quite a shock to them based on the push back. I feel like a pelican in a Louisiana oil slick. It was something to behold.
The important think Rob is that we have accomplished everything we set out to accomplish with this column. It has exceeded expectations from what I expected.
Someone wished I would hurry up and die via Twitter the other day. I won't use their name or handle but it is their refuge name, they are Tibetan Buddhist. It isn't John Pappas, for those playing along at home.
If you think I'm an angry man you are obviously don't know who you are talking about. . As people who know me have described me, I'm not someone to fuck around with, which I can't disagree with.
If that threatens you, I'm sorry to hear that. Try growing a pair, and get back to me. See, I can write angrily, without being angry. It's called writing. You might look into it. You don't know me. I'm just not your cup of tea.
Bill
Firstly, I highly doubt a Buddhist- a real Buddhist – would feel this pain you feel- all the while talking about letting it go- nor bother to be small enough to try to rally support for a cause such as this. My heaven's – I have not read something so utterly void of value in a while – but it was compelling- being written by a "Tibetan Buddhist" and all *sigh* – There is nothing remotely Buddhist about this post or attitude. Is quite childish, actually. You can cite buddhist sayings, read all the books- doens't make it so. I read Popular Mechanics- and I am neither popular nor a mechanic.
I do wish you well with your health, however.
Miriam,
You don't get it. That's fine with me. So you don't like Tibetan Buddhists. I understand. Thanks for the comment. Usually I have to think of a fitting response.
Obviously, your comment speaks for itself. This groundswell of traffic and comments is without rhyme or reason as far as you are concerned. There's nothing here.
People have just suddenly responded over something I totally pulled out of my ass. I wish I could do whatever that is on a weekly basis. Or, Tricycle has made a mistake.
That's the point of this little exercise. You don't address the sole issue that has grabbed the attention of so many Buddhists on Twitter. Tricycle doesn't follow back, unfollows, and blocks people on Twitter.
Philip Ryan, web editor of Tricycle, blames an overwhelmed employee that couldn't follow 300 people on Twitter. Elephant Journal follows 16,159 people. What is wrong with this picture?
You don't know. Nobody knows. That's where this little experiment began last week. Tricycle didn't want to talk about it. Waylon tried to get an explanation, but they had no explanation.
Finally, I told Waylon I could get their attention where he failed. I wish they had listened to Waylon a week ago. They waited a week to apologize to Buddhists on Twitter.
Twitter, which has been around since 2006 is too new for Ticycle to comprehend. Well, it is if you don't know what you're doing. Again, Waylon tried his best.
After a week of stonewalling, we decided to demonstrate how Twitter works. We have a narrowly defined issue with Trycycle which resonates with people on Twitter.
I've been listening to the people that follow me. The people Tricycle can't be bothered to follow back. All I had to imagine was how they felt. It was a no brainer for me what the issue was.
There are plenty of people that don't care. How many people have to suffer before it matters? I'm pleased that Tricycle has apologized to the 5000 people that follow them on Twitter.
All you need are a small percentage of people disappointed with you on Twitter to generate a significant amount of ill will towards your brand in social media.
Tricycle can ride this out, of course, which is where they are at as of this moment. Ironic, how all they needed to do was listen to Waylon a week ago,
Bill
“Don’t push your wisdom onto others; it doesn’t work.” ~ Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche
Presumably, this could include the wisdom of how an organization should or should not use Twitter.
is this really happening? i can't believe i got sucked into this… help! I need to find my way out of here and back to things that actually matter, like the interview with nathan runkle.
Erika,
Why would someone interested in reading an interview with Nathan Runkle care about Twitter and Trycicle Magazine? Ironically, I couldn't care less about his issue.
I respect him though, and would never post a derogatory about him in an interview with him, and I'm curious why an Elephant Journal reader would do such a thing.
Nothing I write about as a columnist matters to anyone but myself. I write about my experiences, from my perspective. I'm curious, what made you think anything I write actually matters?.
It is from what most think doesn't matters that what matters comes into being for us. Because the plight of animals doesn't matter that it matters to Nathan Runkle.
You may not care about Twitter, Tricycle magazine, or Buddhists. I happen to care about all three. What they did in purging people that they follow was stupid.
I love it when corporations do something stupid. It always makes good copy. How is Nathan doing with his issue? I wish him the best. I'm glad to see an interview with him is being well received.
It hasn't been as well received though as my column, which speaks to what matters to more people? Apparently more people care about corporate stupidity than the plight of animals.
I haven't created this phenomena. It's simply what it is, I leave editorial to Elephant Journal. For some reason they made me a columnist. I accepted before they could take back the offer.
I always expect each colunn to be my last. If I was smart I would quite while I'm ahead. I'll never get the response I got from this column again. If you find a way out of here I'll be right there with you.
This is all a bizarre dream for me I can't escape. I just enjoy writing for a handful of people who like what I write. This being popular is way too much work than its worth.
Bill
Interesting your comment on not following back. I followed you for quite and while and often RT'd some of your posts yet YOU never saw fit to follow me back and even ignored some tweets directly to you.
Perhaps you should look to your own karma before blaming Tricycle.
Chis,
I was only an @reply away. I didn't intend to miss you. I try to follow people back. Sometimes you miss someone. I'm not Tricycle magazine. I don't have someone on payroll to tweet for me.
Perhaps you should study some dharma if you think your making an ass out of yourself in public has anything to do with my karma you moron.
When I look at my karma all I can see is how lucky I am to not be you. That would be a pretty pathetic. You had your chance, and this is all you could come up with?
How about the facts. Tricycle has apologized and are paying attention to Twitter Buddhists. I've accomplished something with this column. A week ago they thought it all a joke.
What have you accomplished online? I thought so. I did what I thought needed to be done. Fortunately, we accomplished something. It was a group effort though. I just played the bad guy in the story.
Since I've become a columnist I've tried my best to follow people back. If I found you uninteresting when I was just tweeting for my own entertainment, obviously, my judgment was pretty accurate.
You can't even distinguish between an individual and corporation. Clearly you aren't the sharpest person out there. My issue was clear, and Tricycle responded.
Now I know how a pelican in an oil slick feels. I respond to all comments gladly, both from my supporters and those that don't support me. It's my job as columnist.
I sympathize with the poor Tricycle employee that had to handle their Twitter account. If I had to read every tweet from every person that followed me for forty hours a week you couldn't pay me enough.
The amount of time I spend on Twitter any given day is a matter of minutes. I check my @replies and direct messages and leave. I throw up an occasional tweet.
I keep an eye on the flow of what people are talking about in my stream of people I follow. You can't follow too many people. Your ability to follow increases apace with the number of people you follow.
I never imagined I would be able to follow over 800 people but it is really much easier than you think. Give me a shout out on Twitter and I will follow you back.
I follow someone who just tweeted me that they wish I would hurry up and die. You can't take this shit so seriously dude. You might want to look into studying some dharma. We have an antidote for that.
Bill
*hehe*
Guest,
My kind of comment.
Bill
what the hell is tricycle? don't you have some breathing to do? let. it. go.
My last comment and then I have to move on to other things that make a living for me. Pema Chodron talks about the addictive quality of anger and how we like to keep going back to it – like picking at a scab. I have wrestled mightily with this addiction so I can better understand it and be happier in life. Some writers and scribblers and talkers in various media have made a good living and built a considerable following by riling the emotions of the audience, primarily among them anger. here's an example — Jay Moriarty , http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2008-08-27/spo… – the Chicago Sun-Times sports columnist that more people hated than loved. or how about our friend Rush Limbaugh http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/today.guest.html. They often do this with inflammatory language and name calling. As the audience, we have a choice whether to turn the dial, call up the website or take the hook and participate in the rumble. As a writer, scribbler, talker in media, we have choices as well – among them to write with care and thoughtfulness [intelligent but not vapid] about the subjects that we hold in our attention and present to others or to fan the flames of emotion [biting and polarizing ]. When we decide to fan the flames of emotion it better be clearly for an important cause, in my thinking, to fight an injustice, set right some wrong and to stir the public to some action. If these conditions are not in place, we lose credibility. As the writer, scribbler, talker I am always highly mindful of the impact my words can have on others and i seek to leave no trace other than a spark of insight or a meaningful question unless some wrong must be righted. That's my position as a journalist. food for thought for all of us.
Sally,
I don't know why Buddhists have such a problem with distinguishing between aggressive, forceful, uncompromising behavior and anger.Not all Buddhists are passive, yielding, and compromising.
I know what it feels to be angry. I was angry with my internist when I found out that I had a heart attack. She thought it was asthma. Six months later I had severe congestive heart failure.
I was furious with her. A simple blood test would have indicated that I had suffered a heart attack. An EKG would have caught it. Unfortunately, I had no chest pain. It wasn't her fault.
I had to process that anger. I had to apply the path of reason to it, and rest in the experience. In time it I got over it.I was like a wounded animal for months.
I've been trained since childhood to be aggressive, formally so. It's a skill set most Buddhists don't possess. What appealed to me most to Tibetan Buddhism was the wrathful deities.
When I saw my first mahakhala thangka I knew I had found my kind of dharma. I'll never forget receiving the Dorje Bernackchen empowerment from Bardor Tulku Rinpoche.
He had received the same empowerment from the 16th Karmapa. Rinpoche doesn't grant it often so it was quite a blessing to receive.Mahakhala isn't for everyone.
Being wrathful isn't about being angry so much as being able to work with aggression. Dorje Bernackchen practice was very helpful when I was a bill collector. I had to be quite aggressive.
It's a cut throat business. I don't think I would have been able to do the job without the practice frankly. It really goes against how we think of Buddhists.
You can be aggressive, forceful, and uncompromising and still be a Buddhist obviously. Anger obscures the true nature of the mind, while aggression for those inclined clarifies the mind.
You know my editor. Neither of us were angry of course. The same can be said of Elephant journal. If we allowed ourselves to be angry we never would have accomplished what we were able to.
People freaked out by how aggressive, forceful, and uncompromising we were with Tricycle neglected to note that we were successful. They apologized for unfollowing hundreds of Twitter Buddhists they had previously followed.
They realized that perhaps it wasn't a good idea to trash relationships in social media. It will come back to bite you in the ass. It took them 48 hours after this column was posted to figure this out.
Before this column they were dismissive of the idea that these hundreds of people unfollowed mattered. It was a non-issue. We made it an issue, and they responded appropriately.
Without the application of the pressure of having us put their feet to the fire they never would have appreciated what exactly they had done. A wrong was righted.
Being passive, what most expect of Buddhists, would have accomplished nothing. Obviously, this has shocked a lot of people. This has been what has driven the tremendous response to this column.
I've written 13 columns for Elephant Journal. None have been written to accomplish anything. This column was written to accomplish something, which it did. That's rare.
I was befuddled when people started to chime in about anger. At first I thought I was reading comments from people who weren't the sharpest crayons in the box.
Then it occurred to me that they expected Buddhists to be door mats. I can understand where they get that idea. There are no shortage of Buddhist pacifists. Like it or not, all Buddhists aren't pacifists.
Bill
Hi Bill –
Fire spinners twirl, breathe and engage with fire at their events to engage the audience — fire is the element they play in. Similarly, you spin words aggressively to engage your audience — in my opinion, anger is the element that you are playing in. Just a statement. No judgment, but to quote you: "Mahakhala isn't for everyone."
As to wrongs being righted. The proper use of social media by legacy media – among which I would count Tricycle in the Buddhist space — is a source of debat. The marketplace of ideas will decide how that all spins out.
They do what they do. You do what you do. I do what I do. We do what we do. I used to love that show-type song at the beginning of the Bugs Bunny Show: "On with the show, this is it."
ARC
Finally, I'm getting caught up on responding to comments. I find it hard to believe this column generated so many comments. Usually I get a few, and they are usually quite interesting.
Yours makes me feel like a pelican in an oil slick. Fortunately, yours will be one of the last. It was written to right a wrong, which it did in short order.
In retrospect, I should have deleted it last week. I would have if I had known that it would generate such a deluge of comments. Yours isn't the worst, actually.
You at least understand that you are missing a huge component to the narrative. I'm stunned as you are that you read it. You don't understand Twitter, and you aren't a Buddhist.
Like Shunryu Suzuki said, "“If it’s not paradoxical, it’s not true,” and that pretty much sums up this column. It is a paradox what happened, now a week ago.
It made no sense what Tricycle did, but it was a moment of truth for them. They didn't have a clue what they had done. There was no malice of forethought involved. It was simply a dumb idea.
I had inadvertently stumbled upon the fact that Tricycle had unfollowed hundreds of people that they had followed for some reason. It made no sense.
Each of those follow backs represented a relationship they had made on Twitter. Nobody just unfollows hundreds of people without a reason.
I couldn't ask them via direct message since they didn't follow me of course. I tried to ask them @tricyclemag but nobody was minding the @replies or chose to ignore my message.
Then I raised the volume to get their attention but failed. It fascinated me. I wrote them an email. I called their office and left a message. It was totally bizarre.
I asked the publisher of Elephant Journal to look into it for me. I wanted to write about my experience for my next column on the subject of futility, which is what this column was written about.
It's important to not limit yourself to the possible. We learn the most from our most futile of endeavors; for example, the story of Milarepa and Marpa.
Waylon wasn't able to get a straight answer from Tricycle. It was just corporate bullshit about focusing on content. They didn't get what they had done.
(continued)
(continued)
They were going to respond, hell or high water, and regret not getting in front of this. I already had the column on futility in my head and all I had to do was write it at this point.
By Friday I had them madder than a wet hen. I had their attention. From that point forward it was simple a matter of leverage. Philip Ryan, Tricycle Web editor, provided me just what I needed.
He had handled himself quite professionally until his final email to me on the subject. In the last graph he lost his focus and went personal on me.
Nobody needs an editor when writing than an editor. My wife is an editor. I showed her the slip up. She had made the same mistake too in her career. Never hit send on an email without reading what you wrote.
I didn't use the email in my column of course. The internet is forever and I thought it a low blow, even for a bill collector like myself. It didn't work for the column anyway.
I had my leverage though. I chilled over the long weekend. I wrote my column on futility. I slapped a provocative title on it and let the internet do its magic.
When I woke up Tuesday afternoon Tricycle was all over it. The next day they apologized on their blog for trashing hundreds of Twitter followers without explaining themselves first.
This was my unlucky 13th column for Elephant Journal. It was a hell of a ride; over a thousand views and over a hundred comments, mostly negative I might add.
Ironically, a simple response on Twitter to my original question and none of this nightmare would have happened. It just so happened I was one of the hundreds of people they unfollowed.
If you unfollow a person you have a relationship with on Twitter you can't communicate with them via direct message. That's why it is so important to follow people back on Twitter if you are a brand like Tricycle.
It's all about making relationships and connecting to your audience's network of relationships. If you are a brand on Twitter your follow backs are golden.
So that's the huge component you missed. You aren't alone. I'm taking a break this week from my column. I earned it. This column exceeded all expectations. It was a huge success.
That isn't why I write for Elephant Journal though. I'd much rather write for my small audience. I'd much rather discuss the dharma with people I know than explain myself to random strangers.
If Waylon doesn't pull the plug on Elephant Journal, which he said he would this month, perhaps I will write again but I'm in no rush to do so.
The past week was awful for me. Nobody had the whole picture and I came out holding the dirty end of the stick despite the success of the column in terms of righting a wrong. It wasn't worth the effort it took.
Bill
All in all, I like her. Yes, I think she is dramatic at times, but it seems like everyday communication includes a little showmanship to convery your message. I’ll tell you, she seems to have a great style! I like her!
Hey – nice blog, just looking around some blogs, seems a pretty nice platform you are using. I’m currently using WordPress for a few of my sites but looking to change one of them over to a platform similar to yours as a trial run. Anything in particular you would recommend about it?
great resources here. I’ll be back for the next your posting. keep writing and happy blogging.
After searching BING I found your site about Tricycle: Not Interested in Twitter Buddhists? | elephant journal and another one called http://wholesalewaterproducts.com . I think both are good and I will be coming back to you and them in the future. Thanks
You actually make it seem so easy with your presentation but I find this matter to be really something which I think I would never understand. It seems too complex and extremely broad for me. I am looking forward for your next post, I’ll try to get the hang of it!
[...] is an engaging Twitter denizen who drew attention previously for his battle against Tricycle magazine because that publication would not follow him back on Twitter. (Here’s how @tricyclemag [...]
[...] exactly what the negative consequences of eating certain foods are, and reveals the opacity of Buddhist ethics as applied to food. Yet this process performs a necessary role for Buddhist practitioners by [...]
I gotta post this, even if it seems like beating a dead horse with s stick.
I am on Facebook. I have regular posts from elephant and also Tricycle. Elephant now wants me to pay for more than 3 looks a day and Tricycle is totally free. So – I pay Tricycle for their magazine. I am reluctant, unfortunately to pony up $12 a year to Elephant. I miss a lot of wonderful writings on elephant. I also respect the opinion of Tricycle. Sorry, Bill. Sometimes we should respect the "no" and walk away. I have friends and acquaintances that try to push me when I say no and I resent them. Why not have some respect for other people's initial responses? That is their business decision. Your choice is to seek other methods of following Tricycle or walk away.
Boxing is whole of the oldest sports known already in ancient Rome and Greece [1]. He was known in the Games in earlier Greece. Still Fighting two players were hugely ferocious and over ended in death. These struggles, without any specified rules, had teeny to do with sport, which was born in 1719 in England. At that time, James Figg, considered the firstly guardian in the history of England, founded in Tottenham Court Route in London “academy” of boxing. Fighting did not show gloves and asked blows until story of them fell to the forces [2]. Jack Broughton, who in 1730 replaced the Figge, quest of 18 years retained the right and from the word go codified the rules of the display grounds. Shaken before death in the ring a specific of his opponents, George Stevenson, formulated and implemented a start the ball rolling of rules known as the Broughton’s Rules. Gloves, today the primary attribute of a boxer, on the other hand appeared in 1881. In 1916 it was an prominent ruling to limit the seemly fighting as a replacement for the championship to 15 rounds of three minutes each, with breaks jednominutowymi. As regards lovers of the method is narrow to three three-minute rounds. In the 80s Twentieth century, as a result of the cheerless cessation of Korean boxer Kim Duk-koo, polished fighting is narrow to 12 rounds.
Unpaid boxing [edit]
As an layman boxing frolic holds a specialized post in the Olympic institution, appeared in fact as early as 1904, at the Olympics in St. Louis, and was missing however once, in 1912 (ample to the prohibition on the sport in Sweden). He returned at the next Olympics in Antwerp (1920). Numerous thorough set heavyweight champions had been Olympic champions – including Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, brothers Michael and Leon Spinks, Lennox Lewis and Vladimir Klyczko.
Diablo
In 1946 he founded the Global Bush-leaguer Boxing Union (AIBA). It currently has exceeding 190 members (ie national boxing associations). Since 1974, second to the aegis of organized non-professional planet championships.
Controversy [edit]
Despite the multifarious changes – to rehabilitate judging methods and more fit out the boxers and medical misery – accidents in boxing are not queer, spoiling his image. Conflicts between different organizations roszczacymi the right-hand to assent fights for the championship of the world make it unworkable to fix a like hierarchy of players in assorted weight categories. The situation is similar in unprofessional boxing. Looking for this judgement, the IOC has time again threatened to eliminate boxing from the Olympics, outstandingly after the diverse scandals associated with the level of refereeing and some werdyktami judges. To pernicious reviews after boxing help off extremely genuine injuries the players, and imperturbable disastrous accidents.
What a waste of an argument… and article. Maybe Tricycle is choosing to SIMPLIFY and be wise about how they spend their time and energy. I don't let everyone follow me, nor do I follow back everyone who does. But then again, I only Tweet when I'm trying to cut back on my facebook addiction.
Study it, liked it, thanks for it
I guess the one thing that bothers me about this, Bill, is that it implies that one can't have discourse without relying upon a particular venue for social media–in this case: Twitter.
Twitter and Facebook are just as "corporate" as Tricycle (and with much greater influence). When we begin to rely upon these social media giants as our only venues for discussion and start getting pissy when we are unfollowed or unfriended, it seems that we are succumbing to an Orwellian future where social media corporations redefine Newspeak (within a 140 char limit) and our value is determined by the popularity of our tweets.
Naturally, I have no way of knowing what truly transpired between you and Tricycle, but I hope that a Twitter unfollow isn't the source of this argument. Orwell got some things wrong in 1984: Big Brother, as it turns out, is us. When we start using Twitter and Facebook as something more than tools, we succumb to a hegemony that corporations have defined for us. Unfortunately, I see many people that are already there.
That's my Thoughtcrime du jour.
-Matt
Actually, I've had 10 emails with them–back and forth. Sorry for any confusion. I was just relating that this was taking up my time, which is obviously limited, considering he are laying off staff right now. Trike's been v. responsive with me—and sweet, really.
They did say one interesting thing: that they met about this blog this morning, staff meeting, and were all pleasantly surprised by the tone and how constructive all this was. They said some sweet things about you and this whole experience, which has been, well, classically trouble-making.
That's why I love Uncle Japhy! I'll be careful what I wish for!
Great question. I'd personally advise creating columns–then you can hear those you know you like to pay attention to…otherwise, yes, twitter, gets to be a big noisy mob.
You're a brave, good man, Phil, coming on this here blog and being willing to be so open, transparent. Hopefully Bill and the commenters can return the favor by being fair and balanced…er…you know what I mean.
Phil,
I've moved on Phil. You told me you saw no need to clarify your position. You weren't interested in the subject. You didn't get back to me on my offer to give you a first read.
Glad to see we got your attention. How you handled a simple query wrote this column. All I had to do was add my experience of it.
Waylon had to email Ticycle ten times? Too bad you don't follow back on Twitter. You might have noticed how your stonewalling was working for you on Twitter.
I could have instead written a column about how great a job you are doing with reaching out to Twitter Buddhists. Now that the column is published you suddenly care.
It wasn't the "I hate Tricycle magazine" flame job you expected. I simply chose to call Tricycle on what many Buddhist magazines do and write about my experience.
Feel free to write about how you experienced it. I'm sure Waylon would gladly publish it. I'm sure you had a very different experience than I did. How could you not?
My wife read your email response to me. She's an editor at a major book publisher with over thirty years in publishing. As a professional she thought your emails unprofessional.
If you want to cut and paste them here you have my permission. Personally, I found them boring and their sole value to me is that I actually got a response from you.
Too bad you don't follow back so you could have nipped all this in the bud with a simple direct message last Tuesday instead. That's how Twitter works.
It's not about blasting links to your content. If you were less concerned with how many people followed Tricycle and more concerned with keeping your ear to the ground this could have played out differently.
My column isn't about you, or Tricycle, but what I went through with you and Tricycle instead. The week before I wrote about running into an old friend. You get the idea.
Of course, this isn't how you see it. Feel free to write about your experience. If you expect it to be the same as what I experienced, the mind doesn't work that way obviously.
You said you felt no need to clarify your position of not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter. Apparently, that hasn't changed.
When you do we will have something to discuss. Feel free to defend yourself here, but this isn't about you but how I experienced your response to a simple question from someone on Twitter.
Bill
Hmmm…. Now I know Bill is a bit wily (blame Chicago for that) but I have a hard time believing he so egregiously mis-characterized your email exchange… So yeah, let's see that! Intrigue, drama, goody!
Waylon,
He hasn't been though. Philip has yet to decide whether he wants to clarify his position regarding not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter.
Naturally, he wants to instead hide behind the content of his Twitter stream, which has nothing to do with my question. I would too, if I was in his position.
Everyone is welcome to have their opinion. I have mine. Philip has his. When he is ready to do what he declined to do before I posted my column he is welcome to here.
What am I missing? Tell me Philip. Don't stonewall me. Don't expect me to be cowed by your many supporters. Answer the question. Explain your position.
I'm not interested in fair and balanced as much as something real. Be nice to Philip. Apparently he's a bit fragile. Hold nothing back with me. I'm a big boy.
Bill
That's what I meant, John. Feedback is precious for business. And one would expect more for Buddhists. And even more for a publication business: if they write they should read too, right? Bill did not expect Tricycle to reply all the tweets people could send them, but to follow back seems intuitive, since people who follow your magazine on Twitter is the people you should be interested to learn from and know better. Employ people just to read your followers across media sites ~ marketing 101. Seems common sense. Business 2.0.
Waylon,
I try to keep clear of the issue of how people should use Twitter. My wife loves it. She has her tweeps and she is always glad to turn to her Backberry to see what people are talking about.
She only follows people she finds interesting.She can be away from Twitter for weeks and it takes nothing away from the experience. She has good Twitter listening skill.
As a columnist, and a brand with Elephant Journal, I have to always get better at listening to what people are talking about. My column goes hand and hand with my Twitter feed.
Sometimes I get more comments on a `column via Twitter via direct message than here on the web page. People love that kind of access.
Then again Elephant Journal columnist William Harryman named me one of the top ten people on Twitter to follow last year for a reason. I'm sociable on Twitter, and will talk about anything with anyone.
Whether I am Tweeting with Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche who enjoys my tweets or someone like John Pappas who can't stand them it's all good to me.
Only if you think you are better than someone does the volume of tweets matter. You are judging instead of enjoying the flow of ideas. You are calculating, which is fine with me.
Twitter isn't about getting ahead but being present. When you aren't there, you aren't there. When you are there, be fully there; unless you are Philip Ryan of course.
He can't even answer a simple question about not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter. I was just chatting with Shambhala Times on the subject.
It's a touchy subject. Nobody wants to talk about it. That's why I enjoy asking it of Buddhist publications. I could have posed it to anyone last week. It just so happened to be Tricycle.
Please give Philip permission to post to comments here your emails to Tricycle. I have given him permission to do the same with mine to him. This way we are all legally covered.
I found them embarrassing. The web editor of Tricycle could answer a simple question. He was totally out of depth on how Twitter works. I couldn't care less about his feed.
The emails themselves consist of him lamely stonewalling me. If he wants to post them here that is his prerogative. I just want all the emails set out on a time line for all to see.
I have nothing to hide. Everyone can see how boring they are. My question for him remains. He's more concerned about why I am asking the question than answering it I'm afraid.
Bill
Andy,
Well, I've been going back and forth with Elephant Journal today to encourage them to keep the pressure up. There is so much I don't understand about the business end of the internet.
I learned a lot about where our web traffic comes from. I felt we should keep it on the front page. I was surprised that only 20% our traffic comes from the front page.
I still wanted it on the front page. My reason was simple: if I was Tricycle I would hate seeing it on Elephant Journal's front page.The numbers won the day of course.
However people are finding the column they are somehow finding it in numbers sufficient to be featured on the front page. I learned a great deal from my dialogue with Elephant Journal.
I learned that not following back, unfollowing, and blocking people on Twitter is bad business for Tricycle. I was questioning their policy in terms of principle instead of business.
As a matter of principle I thought they should follow people back, and stop unfollowing and blocking people. I figured it a business decision: good for traffic, bad for Buddhists.
Apparently, not only is it bad for Buddhists, its bad for Tricycle too. So at this point I'm more confused than I was a week ago. Why would Tricycle do such a thing?
I'm not an "A" list Buddhist personality with a book coming out this Fall. Like many people commented on Twitter to me, "Why would Tricycle follow you?" Good question.
My answer was that I followed them, and then they unfollowed me due to a change in policy. It was nothing personal, and I believe that. I always thought it was a business decision.
Well, if it isn't personal, and it isn't a sound business practice, I wish someone would please explain to me why in the world Tricycle policy remains as it was a week ago?
I suspect they don't believe in Twitter. It's a bit like someone in Texas not believing in air conditioning.I'm sure there are people down their that don't believe in comfortable indoor temperatures.
I imagine someone at Tricycle saying "We don't need no stinking Twitter account," echoing the line "We don't need no Stinking badges" from the classic "Treasure of the Sierra Madre."
Waylon tells me that his Google analytics are showing that this column alive and well working its way through the internet. Philip Ryan, Tricycle web editor, who seemed eager to defend his policy, has not been heard from oddly.
At first he didn't want to clarify their position. The the column was posted, and he wanted to, but we haven't heard from him since. The response has been amazing both in views comments.
I'm not accustomed to a lot of comments so I'm behind. I can manage one or two at a time if I'm feeling well enough. I look forward to reading and responding to everyone.
Bill
Hey Bill,
I always learn something from reading your comments. You've helped me re-gain a kind of balance in my approach to dharma, ha…ha…the emptiness balance, I guess you could call it.
I don't Tweet and don't really understand all this following, not following, blocking business, etc. But it doesn't matter. It's not the content that's taught me, it's the process. I learn from wherever learning is to be had. Every moment, every moment becomes the teacher. And I love the Dharma.
I want you to take care of your health because I'm selfish. I want to keep reading your posts. That's truly how it is.
Cheers.
And thanks again.
Clara,
I appreciate the spirit in which you are writing this (pro communication & exchange of ideas), but Bill's vitriol, especially against one employee of Tricycle: Phillip (describing him here as "fragile" and on Tricycle's own comments page Bill stated that he "must suck to work for" just to name two occassions), suggests that the illness lies not with the Tricycle web editor (or even that pub), but elsewhere.
Indeed, it appears that Tricycle has been very forthcoming and communicative (Waylon indicates this in regard to his email exchanges) in other forms of communication, including email and a blog post with open comments. The Tricycle web site appears to make great use of social media. They may or may not want to play by Bill's rules of social media, but heck, either way I can't really blame them.
I like Bill and I understand that caustic is his style, but it seems to me this has become less about establishing Tricycle's Twitter Policy (however noble that cause may be . . . ahem), and more about attempting to shame a Tricycle employee–especially one that is starting to look extremely clean now that the dust is settling.
I think as Elephant readers and writers we should tend to our own illnesses (and we all have 'em) before we suggest that another publication tends to theirs.
-Matt
Robert,
They could have dealt with Waylon. I wasn't surprised that Philip Ryan didn't post a timeline and post the complete email record he feels has such exculpatory value to his argument.
I didn't include them because there was nothing in them. That's the point. Tricycle was stonewalling. Now they are blaming some poor employee that couldn't handle following a few hundred people.
Too bad Waylon and Philip couldn't have had a good heart to heart about Twitter. I learn something new whenever I cross swords with Waylon. We don't always agree. I always listen to him though.
I don't agree with Tyler Dewar. I don't agree with a lot of people. My big sister told me I was left by the milkman. This was when everyone had a milkman. I disagreed with her. She put me in a garbage can.
This evening I went for a walk down to the CVS to pick up some cat food. I saw a man's reflection in the window. He was old, had a long gray beard, and was pushing a basket like a walker. I hardly recognized myself.
You know I have been laughing my ass off through all of this from the get go. I thought it might make a good column . It did, based on it receiving 709 views in three days.
I usually get a couple hundred views. I write melancholy little columns about what it's like to die, friends, family, and of course, the dharma. Now suddenly I'm this monster.
More people have viewed this column than a Pema Chodron video also featured on the front page of the Elephant Journal. That's pretty messed up, but that's how people are.
They talk about getting more bees with honey but they love the taste of vinegar. Leave the honey to the bees. People want there read meat online.
To his credit, Waylon is keeping the pressure on Tricycle. We argued about it. He schooled me on where our traffic comes from. Only 20% comes from the front page.
I was amazed. Then I told him, if I was Tricycle I'd hate seeing this column on the front page of the Elephant Journal. Fortunately, the numbers spoke for themselves and it was a moot point.
You get what I'm doing. It isn't readily apparent even to people that know me. Just as I didn't recognize my own reflection in a storefront window. Samsara can be a very tricky place to call your home.
Bill
They did say they've unblocked folks, I believe. As for following folks back, I do believe more the merrier personally–I follow about 16,000 folks right now via http://www.twitter.com/elephantjournal …using tweetdeck, it's easy to sort into groups or columns of "friends," "movers + shakers," searches I have for "Trungpa," etc.
Outdoing Pema! Actually, I might view that as a good thing…I think open dialogue, messy as it is, doesn't get enough space in Buddhist media or sangha publications. Rick Fields, (in)famously, resolved to quit as editor of the Vajradhatu Sun when he was not allowed to print anything about the difficult events and questions surrounding the Vajra Regent in the late 80s.
Thank god for the blogosphere, now—there's no smothering gossip, now…and gossip, unsmothered, has a chance to become uplifted communication.
Again, my confusion in explaining (via twitter DMs, probably!), but Trike did respond consistently and caringly to me. We went back and forth 10 times, at least, which is what I was trying, clumsily, to explain to Uncle Bill.
Bold words, and I agree with most of them. I do think Tricycle could use twitter more, and more consistently, and more effectively…but I don't fault them for that. I, too, didn't use twitter much until I was schooled, pushed into it really, by one of my 20 year old web designers.
He said, you'll love this! Use tweetdeck! Sort who you're following. Be personal!
In any case, Phil and James both have been warm and caring in emails to me and about Bill. I think Bill, for the most part, has been gentle and fair. Of course, Bill never refrains from sticking it to The Man, whoever he decides that is. In this case, Phil.
The happy ending for me, here, would be to see Bill followed, and tweeting about the happy resolution, and to see Tricycle and Shambhala Sun and all "mindful" media sources using social media to offer the Dharma in all six directions.
Waylon,
Hmm . . . I'm not sure I read Bill being "gentle and fair" to Phil even in this comment stream. But I can understand that it might read differently by someone who is closer to Bill.
Sure, it would be cool if Bill were followed, but I don't think a strategy of what appears to be badgering and bullying an individual to make that occur is very cool or compassionate. It is one thing to publicly holler at a corporation–quite another to openly criticize an individual with apparently empty accusations, especially when that person's livelihood is closely connected to the criticism.
At the end of the day, whether or not Tricycle follows Bill is a very small thing. Dragging a person's name through the mud is not.
Some might see this as some sort of "tough love," but the fact that it is directed at an individual using language that could be deemed *derogatory* makes it an ethically shaky position at best. At worst, it could evolve into a libel suit–but fortunately we're dealing with Buddhists on both sides. Whew!
-Matt
Waylon,
As far as I'm concerned we have accomplished what we set out to do. I have no desire to be followed by Tricycle on Twitter. When I first started I thought it a good follow. It turned out to not be.
They don't tweet. It never occurred to me to unfollow them. Why unfollow someone that rarely tweets? The whole premise that this was personal is ludicrous.
I have no personal animus for Phil or James. I was simply applying pressure as I saw fit. I found nothing warm and caring in not responding to tweets, emails, and phone calls.
His email response to me was petulant and insulting. I don't blame him though, I did lean into Philip like I meant it. I didn't take his attitude personally though.
Again, I'm not looking for mediation. I wrote my column. It had the intended effect. It has garnered over a thousand views and more comments than I can keep up with.
Most important, it prompted Tricycle to come clean and apologize for something they stupidly did without thinking it all through. That's why twice my regular audience read it in 4 days.
Obviously, there was something to it. Something didn't smell right. Now that we've aired it out, what we should do as journalists, the facts speak for themselves.
Was it pretty? No it wasn't pretty. Did we accomplish what we set out to do? We did just that, and nothing more. Did it have to be this way? No, but Tricycle chose the path they did.
A simple warm and caring response to my first tweet to them on the subject last week, which they ignored, would have resulted in a totally different column.
I appreciate that Tricycle is a friend to you. As publisher of Elephant Journal you could have said don't go there but much to my surprise you didn't spike the idea.
You know a good story when you see one. There is nothing you need apologize or re-frame to appease the natural push back from those that disagree with your judgment.
It actually inspired my faith in the idea that not all dharma brats have no grit. You did the write thing, when I thought you would choose your friendships over the column.
We had a good run. They pushed back. That's to be expected, but we challenged Tricycle magazine and every Buddhist magazine on Twitter to a look at how they are using Twitter. Enjoy the moment.
Bill
NellaLou,
Just some closing irony on my part. You are correct; it is not a rule. Buddhists are capable of all sorts of things.
-Matt
Nella Lou,
My column was professionally edited and vetted to make sure I stuck to statements of fact, It is perfectly legal to speak truth to power.
I bent over backwards in this regard. I'm sure Philip did the same on his part. If he had broke the law I would avail myself of the legal system without a second thought.
I did just that when someone threatened me on Twitter. Tricycle has apologized, confirming in fact that they did in fact do as I alleged. Philip, as Web editor was responsible for this.
I had asked if he would like to clarify or further consider his position on the matter. I even offered to provide him with a copy of the column before publication.
All he had was derision for me in response. He changed his tune Tuesday morning after my column was posted. Apparently it was more of an issue than he thought previously.
If Tricycle wants to take legal action for something they have already apologized in their own blog they are welcome to file suit. I'd love to visit New York at their expense. They would lose.
Bill
Nate,
I agree completely–this topic is unworthy of Elephant and Bill, IMHO.
You may have noticed this very Ponlop quote was used as the opener to Bill's article. Irony brings us full circle: pushing notions of "Twitter etiquette" has been used to justify some bad behavior.
Maybe some good will come of this if the real ignorance of the situation–which has little to do with social media–is revealed.
"You don't get it. That's fine with me. So you don't like Tibetan Buddhists"
reminds me of Bushian ways of arguing. By the way, I completely agree with Miriam, and come to think of it (which I usually don't waste my mind on anymore – we did such things as school kids, keep long lists of likes & dislikes & be totally fascinated by our own little egos) – hey, I've been practicing Tibetan Buddhism for years, and most of my friends are Buddhists too. What is this working up on a company's (not even a real person's) policy on following and unfollowing in an artificial twitterverse all about? Certainly not about the core questions on buddhism, or let's rather say the dharma, meaning "what is", because I feel sorry for people who are attached to artificial "isms" ( kindly consider DPR's post, "Buddha wasn't a Buddhist").
If one chooses to stress his "isms" the way you do so strongly, Bill, why not use the time to do some more mani mantras instead. There is no essence in emotions such as anger, hatred, and jealousy. you keep saying you feel your time is running up, so why not apply the precious teachings your masters gave you, and liberate what eats you up from the inside?
Every moment counts. Don't waste your precious human life.
Prayers for your & your wife's good health
sincerely,
Sarah
Sarah,
You have been interested in Tibetan Buddhis for years, you are most welcome. I helped establish Tibetan Buddhism in Chicago. I'm an original adopter of the Karma Kagyu lineage here.
I'm dying, my heart has stopped twice in the last year. I have faced death twice and lived to talk about it. My life is like a dream. All I have is the present moment.
You don't get Twitter. I get that. You struggle for an analogy, a lame one, given who you are speaking to, instead of admitting you don't understand something.
Perhaps you should be spending more time practicing than surfing the internet. When I was a newbie to Tibetan Buddhism I was on the cushion 8-10 hours a day.
I've dedicated my entire life to my lineage, and exchange tweets with Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche on a regular basis. He has been quite helpful.
His personal guidance via Twitter really helped me prepare for having my defibrillator inserted. They have to stop your heart to test it. I didn't want to miss that.
Most people can't remember it. They are to high. They really dope you up. Fortunately, as a lifetime Karma Kagyu, being stoned out of your mind and being awake at the same time is a piece of cake.
So Twitter has been very good to me. You have no idea of what you have missed. I put that in the past tense for a reason. The level of following back has diminished over the past year.
We can thank celebrity/brand tweeting/marketing for this. Those you want to follow, like Tricycle, don't follow back. It's a bit like sitting next to someone in a bar and being ignored when you make eye contact.
It's rude, plain and simple. I'm sure you understand this. Twitter has become a bar where everyone acts like a dick basically.
When Tricycle purged hundreds of people they had followed from their first tweet without explanation I called them on it. I tweeted them asking why they dumped so many people.
They didn't just trim who they followed, they wiped out hundreds of relationships cultivated since they began on Twitter. It was the biggest bone head move I've ever seen on Twitter.
On Twitter, Tricycle needs every relationship they can find because there are a lot of people that despise Tricycle as a symptom of all that is wrong with Buddhism in the West.
When I asked Tricycle why they purged who they follow, my @replies filled with Tricycle haters congratulating me for my good luck in being unfollowed by them.
I don't feel that way about Tricycle. I simply unfollwed them back without a second thought, other than that I had a topic for my next column; strictly business. I never took it personal.
I made it personal to apply pressure to Tricycle. I wanted to see if we could get Tricycle to apologize, which they have, and reconsider their approach to Twitter.
I have succeeded in both. I cleaned my plate. I have no unfinished business with Tricycle. When your life is reduced to nothing but a moment that's how you roll.
When I start something I finish it. I will never again have the chance to do what I did with this column. It was a singular experience. I won't ever be in this position again.
As you said, "Every moment counts. Don't waste your precious human life." I walk your talk. Can you say the same? I didn't think so.
Bill
Hi Bill – I agree that TriCycle is not following good twitter etiquette nor an effective social media strategy.
"I did my job as a web 2.0 journalist. Before I was asked to be a columnist for Elephant Journal I was named by William Harryman of Integral Options Cafe as a Buddhist to follow on Twitter. "
I understand why people enjoy your Twitter stream – the quotes you use are wonderful and well curated. But I have to disagree with your characterization of this Tricycle column as doing your job as a " Web 2.0 journalist." If it is to be classified as journalism, I would classify it more as gossip column, name calling – not my favorite brand although its ilk might be published in some ill tempered yellow newspapers as you would say "back in the day."
I like it better when you write about the Dharma. In my opinion your writing is best when it reflects your personal experience of the Dharma and your unique interpretation of how to best live your life in Dharma and gives me a kind of lesson that makes me think about my life. I have personally heard you tell these kinds of stories many times verbally.
I am sorry you are not well and I wish that your health improves. you have my best wishes for developing your true voice as a writer.
I was happy to hear that your wonderful wife is getting better and with some care and attention will be back to her old self soon.
Cheryl,
Of course none of this matters. I have chosen to make it matter to me. The causes and conditions of the moment came together and produced this singular result.
I grabbed my relative truth, my perception of what Tricycle had done, like a surfer their surf board and ran into the ocean of samsara like a madman.
With nothing but my own perspective I dove into the breach of a truly unique experience of the true nature of the mind. And I got my ass kicked.
Tricycle magazine laughed in my face. It was a big joke that I was going to write a column about Tricycle's twitter account. I told them they didn't want me to write about this subject.
I explained that Elephant Journal has over 100,000 unique visits per month and that this would damage their brand. But they really underestimated Elephant Journal readers.
Here we are after four days with a column that maybe gets a couple hundred views on average has over a thousand views for something that doesn't matter.
Tricycle has switched from derision to apologies in just four days, which they could have done the week before, and I would have written a glowing column about Tricycle.
Only a couple hundred people would have viewed the column and it would have dropped into the archive after a couple days. I don't have a very large following as a columnist.
Something about this non-issue to so many people not on Twitter has obviously resonated with a larger audience than my regular readers.
I don't know what this says about the dharma of those that don't care about something simply because it is empty of self-existence, a bit like throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
There is a relative truth, that which is deluded, and an ultimate truth, which is undeluded. When the undeluded are with the deluded they choose to appear deluded.
There's a story of a king. His kingdom went insane from drinking from a well. To benefit them, after failing to protect them from the tainted water, he drank from the well and lost his mind. He was a Mahasiddha.
He had taken all the necessary precautions to protect himself from the tainted water. It was impossible for his people to do the same despite his best efforts.
So he chose to be deluded, to see the world as his people see it, instead of seeing the world as it appeared to a sane person.
There is no ultimate truth without relative truth. What Tricycle does, or what I do, ultimately is like a dream, and just as meaningless. It has to matter if it really doesn't matter.
Bill
"Buddhists are capable of all sorts of things. "
For that I am very grateful.
Bill,
thank you for your reply. I now better understand the motivation behind your campaign, from a business point of view. I think it is everyone's free choice who is on twitter (or on web 2.0, for that matter), to allow it as much space in their life as they want. However, from a buddhist point of view, I think one should bare in mind it is an artificial universe, with even more causes and condition for confusion, misunderstanding and futile emotional upheaval than samsara itself confronts all of us everyday. you can choose what you're in here for- use it as a tool to spread, and exchange, the seeds of awareness, enlightenment, and inspiration, as DPR and a number of other teachers and fellow practitioners do, or you can use it to inflate your ego by spamming the world with futilities or even hate campaigns that are of no benefit to no one. that is why an "anger-campaign" coming from someone like you at first didn't make sense to me. and, I should add that your original post didn't really clarify your intention. I'm glad you made that clarification now, and I will continue reading your posts which I enjoy, although sometimes I don't agree with your opinion. But I wouldn't want to read it if I shared all your opinions (that'd be too boring).
Glad to hear that you have no unfinished business, and that, as you said, you have "cleaned your plate". However, this leaves me with one kind suggestion- even if on twitter most people behave in the way you described and mostly will assume identities that make them look better (or different) from who and what they really are, please be careful with your judgments and think twice before lashing out at people. I personally couldn't care less- you don't know me and I don't know you, and all I did was voice a bit of concern about your anger. you may not appreciate that, that is totally fine with me. but rest assured that as a pracitioner of 20 years, and more than 6 years spent practicing more than 8 hours a day, I mean what I say. I actually had to calculate these numbers. Numbers are of no importance to me. But lashing out at people, as for instance at Miriam, not only creates anger and confusion, it also gets the wrong message across as to what being a buddhist practitioner is all about.
Regards,
Sarah
Sorry, Bill, that argument doesn't hold water. My premise is not mistaken.
My argument is clear and you are skirting the issue: you ended up targeting an individual, not a corporation, with comments that I would consider derogatory. There were also false statements made regarding the "10 emails" that Waylon repeatedly asserted as actual communications between him and Tricycle–not foiled attempts to contact Tricycle. You either weren't tracking Waylon's assertions or you were misconstruing the email stream.
And "truth to power?" C'mon, this is Tricycle magazine, not Enron.
A better story regarding a "corporation" would be the sycophantic capitulation to all things Twitter. Based on your comments it appears that if someone doesn't follow Twitter conventions it gives others carte blanche to treat that person badly. This isn't my Dharma and I doubt it is the Dharma of Karma Kagyu.
You're making Karma Kagyu sound as if it is "do what you will." Based on my cursory study of the lineage, it starts with ethics and compassion just like other Tibetan schools.
The truly fascinating thing is that I see that Tricycle now follows ~71 people. Wow. The Berlin Wall just came down. I guess the end justified the means.
I still maintain that you're better than all this, Bill. You are a powerful force here on Elephant and you can do great things with that bulldog attitude–but I'm not going to eat your BS.
Just speaking Truth to Power here–I'm sure you can appreciate that.
-Matt
There is no "truth to power" phrase in media law that I've seen and I've taught aspects of media ethics and law at the college level.
Libel (published statements through media that is written and seen, but can include radio, television & Internet) and slander (spoken and heard) occur when a person or entity communicates false information that damages the reputation of another person or entity.
Truth is an absolute defense in a libel case, but it has to be proven in some way. Published false criticism or lampooning of "public figures" like politicians and celebrities is more acceptable and it is much harder for a public figure to prove he/she has been libeled than it is for a private person. A public figure can bring a libel suit, however, if they can show malice–evidence that the person who communicated the defamatory falsehood(s) did so knowing that the statements were false or had doubts in regard to the truth of the statements.
A plaintiff has to file and prove a libel suit–it's not as if a paddy wagon is going to come and pick you up as soon as something that looks like libelous statements are noticed by the authorities.
Of course, I like to think that as yogis and Buddhists we should hold ourselves to a higher ethical standard than making sure our statements aren't legally actionable.
Very nice, Sarah. I myself could benefit from following your compassionate example.
-Matt
Sarah,
I appreciate your commitment to sangha harmony but make a presumption for which there is no basis in fact. At no point was I angered by Triclycle.
Your entire argument falls to pieces if I was not angry. Anger is debilitating. A lifetime of merit accumulated can be lost in a moment when you allow yourself to be angry.
As a dharma practitioner, I'm sure you know this. You appear to be stuck at emptiness though. Relative reality is just as real as ultimate reality.
I too am inspired by Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche, as you are, but unlike you I don't want to be Rinpoche. I am myself. To want to be Rinpoche is not the point.
Such naivete is what destroyed Trungpa's Vajradhatu organization. In my own sangha, emulating Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche, is the obstacle we struggle with.
Nobody wants to be who they are. This is fine if you are a monk in Tibet and a member of a community of several hundred monks. I'm neither a monk, nor live in a religious community.
I'm familiar to the fantastical approach to Tibetan Buddhism you advocate. It is characteristic of Americans that have adopted the Buddhism of Tibet over the past thirty years.
In the Karma Kagyu, as you well know, Marpa was different than Milarepa, and Gampopa different than both. Each was true to who they where.
Each Karmapa is a unique individual. If we lose this as American Karma Kagyu we might as well become a faith based path of Buddhism which we are not as a lineage.
Our path is the path of reason. Appearances are empty of self existence yet they appear to exist to be explored in all their richness.
The realization of this abundance is the fruit of enlightenment, the dharma of the Mahasiddha. Buddhism isn't the one size fits all proposition you imagine it to be.
I got to play the bad guy, the role of Marpa, in this little performance. When you watch a movie and see someone playing the bad guy do you presume the actor to be bad too? I don't think so.
An experienced dharma practitioner such as yourself should be able to discern the difference between an appearance and it's true nature.
(continued)
(continued)
Yet you have fallen for what I appear to be, hook, line, and sinker I'm afraid. In fact, every step of this process was thought out over a week.
It began on a Tuesday, when the situation was first brought to my attention as a columnist for Elephant Journal. Personally, I didn't care, like most people on Twitter.
Tricycle doesn't tweet. Being unfollowed by someone that doesn't tweet is a non-issue. In fact, being unfollowed by anyone isn't an issue to any of us.
I focused instead on the stupidity of dumping hundreds of relationships without explanation. I thought it would make an interesting column.
Elephant Journal disagreed. My wife disagreed. All my friends disagreed. They all thought I was taking what happened personally.
I explained myself, and Elephant Journal agreed it would make a great column, and that it might even accomplish something beneficial for both Twitter Buddhists and Tricycle.
My wife was a harder sell. She wasn't convinced until she began to edit the column. She had a lot of editorial queries. I answered them all.
Does that sound like angry hateful person? I even offered Philip Ryan, Web editor of Tricycle, a copy of my column before publication.
I bent over backwards for Tricycle. All that I got for my efforts was derision. Finally, I got as far as I could with them, had a nice Memorial weekend.
Only then did I get down to writing my column. Where's the anger and hate in any of this? Tricycle has apologized, better late than never. They are looking into the matter.
That's all that I wanted from Tricycle. I accomplished exactly what I set out to accomplish. If I had allowed myself to be angry none of this would have been possible.
Whether we are talking about BP or Tricycle both are corporations and as such subject to thinking they know better than any individual.
I'm sure someone questioned the wisdom of drilling so deep at BP and asked what would happen in the worst case scenario but corporate thinking won the argument.
The same thinking resulted in Tricycle purging hundreds of relationships they had worked so hard to cultivate since they began on Twitter.
I'm sure they discussed what to do, but not the worst case scenario. Even when presented with the worst case scenario they dismissed it with contempt.
I had a story: my experience of going against Tricycle and utterly failing. I lost the battle. I was humiliated. It was an exercise in futility.
Then the column was posted and everything changed. Suddenly Tricycle cared about Buddhists on Twitter. It was all a big misunderstanding, and so on. How very BP of them.
Examine the facts without the presumption that anger and hatred was my motivation and your entire argument falls to pieces. You are mistaken.
I played the bad guy. I did so knowing that everyone would assume I was the bad guy. If I wanted to be the nice guy, I wouldn't have touched the role.
Think about it, or don't think about it. The choice is yours. I can't control what you think of me. All wisdom comes from mistakenness.
You can be fooled by appearances, or you can realize their true nature, and thus be liberated from your choice of suffering.
Bill
Matt,
Is this how you practice the dharma, by example? Please elaborate. I find this fascinating. It's contrary to the dharma, but fascinating all the same.
I've been up against this paint by numbers approach to the dharma for thirty years. Nobody wants to be who they are. It's pretty pathetic if you think it through.
Sarah is totally fooled by appearances, stuck in a tranquility without insight, and you find this compassionate. I find that very interesting.
I watched a commercial for BP on TV last night. Boy, they really do care. They are saying all the right things, hitting all the appropriate notes.
But what have they done? That's what matters. Compassion isn't what appears to be compassionate. It rarely is what it appears to be.
Sarah knows better. She's a dharma practioner. Yet when confronted with an unpleasant appearance, she rejects it out of hand, without further examination.
Think about it. You can choose the path of reason. Or, you can choose the path of faith. Faith is essential, but it has to come from reason or it will be nothing but blind faith.
Blind faith is very comforting but unfortunately cannot lead to realizing the true nature of the mind. It's a dead end. When you die, you will die unprepared to be terrified.
This is what the dharma is about, not being someone you aren't. As Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche teaches, don't let appearances lead you around by the nose.
In Tibet they would put a ring through the nose of yaks, attach a rope to it, and lead these huge beasts around by it apparently.
When you follow someones example you are allowing yourself to be led around by a misconception. Their is nothing there, like a water moon, a mere reflection of the moon in water.
I admire Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche. He is my guru. I'm nothing like Rinpoche though, despite my samaya with him. I am who I am, just as he is who he is.
In his 80+ years he has never disagreed with anyone. He has dedicated his life to harmony since entering Thrangu monastery as a young man.
The most difficult part of living in a monastery is getting along with everyone. It takes an incredible amount of equanimity, which Rinpoche is well known for possessing.
From his great equanimity developed an even greater compassion. The source of this compassion is not his goodness, but his reason. He's a Khenpo after all.
The touch stone of his practice is appearance emptiness. His teachings focus on the accumulation of merit, and he conducts himself accordingly.
I know him as a yogi of Kham though, and have received from him the blessing of mahamudra, both in formal empowerment and personal instruction.
Appearances can be deceiving. You know this. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know. I appreciate your admiration for Sarah. She is indeed praiseworthy.
But don't try to be anyone but yourself, follow your own example. Examine how you appear to yourself, and try to find that self until you directly experience your lack of self existence.
Habituate yourself in this not finding, and relax into this realization, from which everything we experience arises. The choice is yours.
Bill
Bill,
Nice to have you back!
Although you are reading a great deal into my glib comment, I have to say that I love it. I'll also throw you a bone and say "guilty as charged." Does my train go off the Dharma tracks? Absolutely. I've been a runaway train more times than I can remember. After the wreck, I dust myself off and get back on the track again. It's my little samsaric engine that couldn't. Toot! Toot!
This is the Bill I love to read.
So are we at the "hug it out, bitch" stage or are we still dancing? We better get this thread closed up so we can move on to arguing about your next article.
-Matt
P.S. I don't think Sarah is "rejecting unpleasant appearances" as much as she might be objecting to unfair behavior. But I'll let her speak for herself, if she wishes.
Bill,
We'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. I can repeat myself, but we have different narratives: mine is validated in the comment threads and yours is apparently in the notorious private email stream between you and Ryan. I can't dispute a narrative when I don't have access to the records behind it.
Ryan and Tricycle have moved on and you're feeling good, so I don't want to belabor it.
Earlier it might have helped if these notorious emails had been published–even in excerpted form. Maybe they would have been exculpatory to one of you, or they would appear benign or perhaps you both would have looked like assholes.
But now we'll never know and I don't think it matters at this point.
-Matt
Matt,
My wife and I discussed the emails over dinner. If Philip wants to post them it is his for him to do. The guy has his whole life in front of him.
She agrees that it would be wrong to have those emails come up every time someone Googles Philip Ryan's name.
All I had to do is post the email exchange under the title I wrote instead of writing the column I wrote and posted here.
We also discussed the column, Philip's Tricycle blog, from a professional perspective, editor and writer. I have to say, we're good here.
She edited the piss out of the column and left the vinegar. It was all bite and no growl. I did the write thing not posting for eternity Philip's email.
He wrote a good email until he lost it in the end. It's an occupational hazard according to my wife. Editor's forget they need editors too when writing for themselves.
I appreciate your perspective. When Waylon said I took it easy on Tricycle in my column he wasn't trying to blow smoke up your ass. I took it easy on Philip.
Examine the appearance. Put it under the microscope. Look at the causes and conditions instead of your judgment of the appearance.
What matters is the result. Tricycle has a greater appreciation of how Twitter works than they did before this little exercise.
I'm the bad guy; but I was restrained, believe it or not. The comments are a separate matter. My comments are un-edited and in your face.
You can disregard the time-line of events and the column itself and just go by the comments I've posted in response to a hostile audience.
As expected, there was a definite push back from people who don't examine appearances. In a battle between Tricycle Magazine and my column I lose every time.
Every step of the way I lost the battle but won the war in the end. Was it worth it? No. I had no idea Tricycle would make such a big deal out of it.
I'll never understand why they didn't do what they ended up and doing in the end:apologize and move on. I'd love to ask Philip some day over a drink.
I rubbed him the wrong way? That was deliberate provocation on my part. The strategy was to use Twitter to talk trash and throw him off.
It worked perfectly, of course. I knew someone at Tricycle had to be reading their at replies. Too bad they didn't reply. We could have sorted this out on Twitter.
That would have been against Tricycle policy of course. They could listen but not respond. They didn't follow me so they couldn't direct message me.
We had to use email instead. At this point it was over already. The causes and conditions where already set in motion. The result was inevitable.
As you have noted, Tricycle has moved forward. I'm delighted with the outcome. Waylon can speak for himself.
If it was put to a vote, most people would agree with Tricycle given appearances. Left to causes and conditions though it didn't work out that way obviously.
I'm sorry for the bumpiness of the ride. It didn't have to be this way. There's no doubt that it was one hell of a ride.
Bill
Matt,
I'm always appreciative of people getting in my grill. I had some explaining to do with this column. I was prepared to do so too.
I put a lot of people that trust me as a columnist in a very difficult position. I appeared to not be the person they thought I was.
It was the toughest part of the past week for me.Unfortunately, there was no way Tricycle was going to respond unless I stepped into them in a very public way.
Waylon and Phil would still be exchanging emails like school girls and nothing would have been done. He loves Tricycle magazine.
There would never have been an apology posted on the Tricycle blog. They would never have had the impetus to revisit what they are doing on Twitter. That's all I wanted.
Tricycle stepped up when challenged. I had to put them in an impossible position first. That was very unpleasant, and made me look bad in the process.
I'm okay with looking bad. The Karma Kagyu are easily the baddest Buddhists out there. We really have a thing for going where good Buddhists can't.
Our dharma protector, Dorje Bernackchen, really has the toughest job of all the dharma protectors out there keeping us out of trouble.
Appearances can be deceiving, and that's a good thing. We would have nothing to work with as dharma practitioners if everything was as it appeared.
If not for this lack of self-existence we could never experience the luminous nature of the mind which makes all things possible. That would suck big time.
I wanted to unfollow myself. I was horrible to Philip but there was no other way than making a scene given the circumstances. I made one hell of a scene at that.
I felt bad for him. It was his call though. I was never going to get a second shot at this. Nobody else wanted to call them on what they did; nobody cared.
I gave Tricycle and those people out there that don't care about Twitter something to focus on: my unbelieveable assholeness in attacking Tricycle.
In the process even though a lot of people hated me for it, what I did brought attention to what obviously concerns a lot of Buddhists on Twitter.
It didn't concern most, but it concerned enough. I had a plan though, and it worked to perfection. It cost me some friendships, but it was worth it.
I don't know Sarah, so I am at a disadvantage. She seems to think she has me all figured out. She knows better. I know that much about her.
She's concerned about sangha harmony which is a big deal in Tibetan Buddhist circles. I have a broader definition of sangha which includes the excluded.
I'll rock the boat if I have to if the end result is to include those that want to get into the boat. There's plenty of room for all of us.
Bill
Bladzatit,
I love the Shambhala sangha here in Chicago. They have treated me very generously over the years despite being a disciple of Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche. They smile when they shudder if I bring his name up.
Poor Vajradhatu; you are stirring up some childhood memories for me: the Naropa Poetry Wars, the Holloween party at the Seminary that started it all.
That's ancient history, though. The Vajra Regent's tragic death, and the death of his disciples he is said to have transmitted AIDS to through unprotected sex. None of that matters anymore.
If those are hiccups, they didn't feel like hiccups at the time. I was a hand rolled Tibetan Buddhist back then sipping tea in KTC Chicago watching Vajradhatu implode in scandal.
We would all thank our lucky stars back then that our guru was Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche. We would share stories of how we each almost ended up following Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche instead.
Everyone had a story, of course. Mine was walking into the Vajradhata center here in Chicago over on Clark Street north of Belmont. It was a renovated loft with a scenic urban vista. It was a gorgeous piece of real estate.
I bound up the stairs clutching my copy of "Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism" looking like Dennis Hopper in "Easy Rider" full of enthusiasm.
Their first center was on Lincoln Avenue but when I finally found it they had closed down. I then hoofed my way over to Clark and Belmont. I loved reading all things Trungpa when I was in college.
I had taken a leave of absence from graduate school. My mentor suggested I check out Buddhism if I was really interested in it. I was supposed to be a Sociologist. I had to make a choice.
Imagine my shock when I got to the front desk manned by a receptionist. It was like thinking you were walking into a bar but instead walking into a church.
It was the height of the Church of Trungpa, no different that any cult of personality of the day. It was the era of the Jonestown Massacre. I didn't need a Masters in Sociology to know what was going down.
If I hadn't read an ad in the local alternative newspaper offering instruction in traditional Tibetan Buddhist meditation I would have returned to teaching the Marxist perspective of Criminology to future Social Workers.
My girlfriend at the time had just signed a lease and I couldn't reclaim my spot in the Sociology department anyway until next fall anyway. I decided to check out the free Tibetan Buddhist meditation.
Gary Snyder always advised seekers to go traditional, learn from lineage holder, and then bring what you learned home. That was his prescription for establishing the dharma in the West.
This wasn't the same as working my way across the Pacific as a merchant seaman scraping bilge and writing poetry but we each have our own causes and conditions to work with.
That's how I became a hand rolled do as you are told Karma Kagyu. This was before Tibetan Buddhism in America of course. Doing what you are told back then was putting into practice your guru's instructions.
No two disciples had the same practice; thus I describe it as hand rolled. It was nothing like it became after the 16th Karmapa passed away.
Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche has been my rock for thirty years now. It has been an amazing journey. When I told him I was dying and requested his blessings and instruction for the bardo of death it was a short conversation.
All he had to say was "Be prepared to be terrified," and we reviewed what I should be doing between then and the end. He added that he didn't feel that I was going to die anytime soon.
Our lifespan is determined by our accumulation merit. Although my heart was failing me he felt contrary to my prognosis I still had some life left in me. I only felt like my tank was empty
(continued)
(continued)
.
I leaned into Tricycle like a Dutch uncle when they cut bait on hundreds of people they had previously followed on Twitter. I didn't spare any stick. This column left a mark they won't soon forget.
I've never been able to afford the Tricycle Buddhist lifestyle. It was always like reading the Sears catalog as a kid. It was good for dreaming but nothing like I would find under the tree Christmas morning.
They do what they do well. I'd never have had a thing to call them on until they pulled the bone head social media move of the year. Fortunately, they stepped up and apologized for their mistake.
Otherwise, we are good as far as I'm concerned. Uncle Bill's whack smarted I'm sure, but I'm confident they will get over it. If they don't, that's their problem.
Tricycle knows I'm out here. Before the column they thought it was a big joke. They were amused. I have column on Elephant Journal and a Twitter account. They are Tricycle magazine.
They treated me with contempt for having the nerve to question them. I told them exactly what I was going to write. Their response was that they couldn't care less.
I had a relaxing Memorial Day weekend. Monday morning I sat down and wrote the sucker. My wife edited out the piss and left the vinegar, and I re-wrote it until it was no bark and all bite.
I posted it early Tuesday morning before going to bed. When I woke up Tuesday afternoon all hell had broken loose. Tricycle magazine felt my boot up their ass and wanted it out.
After this column they suddenly cared. A handful of outlaws felt me but most people didn't. The benevolence of the Dutch Uncle always appears to be harsh and uncalled for, which was the most common response I received for.
Only in America can an individual go against a corporation and the natural sympathy of most of us is for the corporation it seems. Despite all that corporate-think has done to this country since the crash.
Millions of people unemployed while corporate America pays bonuses to those responsible for ruining our lives yet we still bow before the almighty brand.
I tried to tell Tricycle this was going to hurt their brand. They in their corporate think had decided what was best of course. Fortunately, the individual has a tool in new media in the 21st century.
I think I've responded to your comment. If I have missed anything I'll gladly respond. Everything is a disappointment when you allow yourself to be fooled by appearances.
Bill
Kelly,
I always respond better to people that use their names. I found your snide. My wife asked, "Who is this bitch?" She's a woman so she can go there.
I responded, "I don't know; apparently, WomanBeWise58; she could be anyone." Read what you posted as a comment. Like my wife said, it was bitchy and uncalled for.
I had nothing to say in response. I try to respond to all comments. Even those not worth dignifying with a response like yours. If you don't like my tone, you should have checked your own when you commented.
I didn't want to just respond in kind. I really wanted to push your buttons, which I obviously did. Perhaps you will think twice about posting such comments in the future.
We wanted to right a wrong with this column, which we succeeded in accomplishing. You belittled both the effort and the result.Yet you are offended by my response. Good. That was my intent.
This is what happens when you post insulting comments. You get it right back. You might not expect that from a Buddhist. It's a common misconceptions that Buddhists are doormats.
I've written 13 columns for Elephant Journal. This one had a specific purpose, which it accomplished. A wrong was made right. You denigrated this.
I wish this column wasn't necessary but it unfortunately was. Like I told Tricycle I would much rather write about something else. I just happened to stumble upon what they had done.
I happened to try to send them a direct message last week and I couldn't, which I thought strange. I asked them what was up, but they stonewalled. This piqued my interest, as a columnist.
I sent them emails. They didn't respond. I called their office, but they didn't return my call. Finally, I was able to contact the person responsible for this mess.
Tricycle didn't take me seriously. They did Tuesday morning when he read my column. Tricycle ended up apologizing in their blog. Try reading your comment in this context for a second.
You can get indigent if you like, but you reaped what you sowed and I have not regrets about how I responded. I certainly put a hell of a lot more time and effort into it than your initial comment.
I'm glad I got your attention. You are obviously a better person than the person that posted your original comment. Hopefully, you have learned something from the experience.
When you post snide comments it encourages others to follow suit and you risk getting more than you bargained for in return for such behavior.
Bill
(continued)
I'd sooner put a stick in my eye than dabble with anger in the name of the dharma. A single moment of anger can destroy a lifetime of dharma practice. You know this of course, but it bears repeating.
So much of dharma practice comes down to habituation. You have to keep at it until you don't have to think about it. When you die you aren't going to have time to think.
My small audience doesn't read me to watch me play with fire. They read me because I have abandoned concealing my own defects. I'm transparent and they appreciate that and keep coming back for more.
The audience this column generated came from the particular causes and conditions of a moment in time put to words. It pitted a disgruntled consumer against a brand. People love this.
There is a law before the House Subcommittee on Courts and Competition Policy which would protect such speech between consumer and brand on the internet.
I agree that I'm the cutting edge of the debate with this column. Tricycle is a legacy publisher no doubt. I am nobody to them, or at least I was before this column.
What they did was without question wrong. I don't care if you are a legacy publisher. You don't dump hundreds of people you had previously followed without being prepared to explain yourself.
They weren't prepared to explain themselves. Their explanation was ridiculous and delivered in a snit and it came back to bite them in the ass big time.
My part in this little misadventure in social media was purely accidental. I happened to try to send them a direct message. Since they unfollowed me I couldn't.
Unfortunately for Tricycle I have a popular column on Elephant Journal. Of the several hundred people they nixed I'm the only one that they eighty-sixed in this particular position.
I felt for those that couldn't do anything about being so rudely kicked to the curb like trash on the information highway. I couldn't care less if Tricycle follows me or not.
Print on paper is dead as you well know as a journalist. It's old the moment you send what you have written to the printing press. We have to be interactive in real time or die as writers.
I'm never going to convince you that a Buddhist can be aggressive, forceful, and uncompromising, without allowing themselves to be angry at that which angers them.
Buddhism is the path of reason according to Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche. You don't see it that way. Most people consider it a matter of faith and following good examples.
That's the secret to success in samsara and has nothing to do with enlightenment. If you have faith in your path and good examples to follow you will do well for yourself.
When you die though, you will be reborn in the lower realms all the same. Human rebirth is the rarest of rebirths in Buddhism. It's enlightenment or bust, at least in the Karma Kagyu lineage.
I was delighted to see your comment. If I had to respond to another comment devoid of anything to think about I would have just gone back to bed and spent the afternoon listening to the rain and wishing I was dead already.
Bill
Hi Bill – My microblogging reply.
"My small audience doesn't read me to watch me play with fire. They read me because I have abandoned concealing my own defects. I'm transparent and they appreciate that and keep coming back for more."
This is undoubtedly true about your audience but I am speaking to something bigger in the world that I have observed in all kinds of media outlets — looking for the "tension" [read conflict] in the story that gets people riled up and drives an audience. Once again it's not my thing although I have dabbled in it myself. After much consideration, I have decided that the operative element in this kind of "journalism" is anger. Not my bag.
"I'm never going to convince you that a Buddhist can be aggressive, forceful, and uncompromising, without allowing themselves to be angry at that which angers them."
You don't have to convince me because I think I understand what you are saying here. The fact that you are saying that I can't be convinced arouses anger in me, but I'm not angry at you. STiLL your statements of assumptions about what I can or cannot be convinced of by their nature play around the fine edges of aggression/anger. I always find it trying when people jump to conclusions about what I do or do not understand – words are very limited. And if actions are "aggressive, forceful, and uncompromising" so be it – Buddhist or not. I accept it.
"Buddhism is the path of reason according to Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso Rinpoche. You don't see it that way."
Finally, please don't tell me which way I see things. Whatever my beliefs they are a mixture of all kinds of systems. I don't have 30 years of Karma Kagyu behind me like you do – true. I am still very much a seeker and in that I follow the path of reason as much as I can in my life — and I think I understand more of the Kagyu view than others give me credit for – I had some pretty intense experiential tutoring over a period of three years.
all that said, take good care of yourself and your spouse. Be well. Sometimes a lighter touch — which is your gift— makes this writing exercise more enjoyable for everybody. Your friend in the Dharma.
Sally,
Being angry at words is no less problematic than being angry at a person. This the nub of the whole anger issue, the habit of projecting self-existence upon that which has no self-existence.
When our friend Scott visits from San Francisco to attend a dharma teaching Gigi asks him to teach her all the latest insults in German.
She doesn't speak German, of course, but it always amuses her. He explains the subtleties of context. After working for Lufthansa from college to retirement he could write a book on the subject.
"Never say this directly to someones face (only to be muttered behind someones back)," he will advise, while others are so subject to interpretation you can get away from it.
I'll never forget the fight you had with Gigi over TIFS on the way to a party. At one point you got so angry you demanded that she stop the car to get out.
I thought you were arguing over tits. Perhaps it's best that you don't play with anger. You are determined to find self-existence even in a person's assumptions.
Thoughts are but appearance-emptiness, an instant of the mind's luminous nature. It's only a mental fabrication with no more reality than a dream.
Language is but a waking dream. It's true meaning is always subject to interpretation. You don't have to pin it down. Just let it be like the wind on Lake Michigan.
Sometimes its dark and rough, while others shimmering to the cribs. It's all just the wind at play on the water. I always find it amazing whenever I walk on the lakefront.
I throw together a bunch of words. Gigi throws most of them away. We discuss the words. The whole process can take an entire evening sometimes.
The words always have to be right for Madame Editor, of course. Every word has to past muster, "Is this what you really mean?"
If the words don't take a position that someone can disagree they with they have to go too. If nobody can disagree with the words as assembled, out comes the highlighter.
Sometimes our little collaboration results in a dark, rough, lake Michigan. These are those thirteen columns we have written that have garnered over a thousand views for the most part.
Elephant Journal readers appear to like it best when the waters are riled. My favorite column was the one with the least views and comments. If it was a picture I would hang it on a wall.
I enjoy most writing melancholy little columns that only a handful of people can perceive much less argue with. This must be the light touch you speak of.
Then there is the business end of being read, the opposite side of the creative process. For lack of a better word, let's call it my "presence," which is my aggressiveness.
Me just being me isn't for everyone. I frame everything for disagreement. It drives Tyler Dewar crazy on Twitter how I twist everything to skewer its intended meaning.
My father would do this constantly at the dinner table every evening. We always had to argue everything from every possible perspective as children.
This is the angle part of being a columnist for Elephant Journal. It's all sharp edges, and always leaves a mark. I know how to twist the knife.
I use Twitter and the comments section for this. It's a totally different process than the writing itself. This is what most people respond to online.
(continued)
(Continued)
As one reader said of this column, he expected a tsunami and got a nudge, a shift in the wind, a mild chop instead. It was just enough, and nothing more.
The audience response was phenomenal. Unfortunately, it isn't my audience. It's more like an online oil slick that is attracted to wherever the heat is to be found.
For this column the heat was from Tricycle. If they hadn't responded it would have just been another column. Unfortunately, they did.
Perhaps it was some word I used, or combination of words I used. Regardless, how they responded isn't my responsibility but theirs alone.
Many people responded quite negatively to this column. They took exception to my words. Upset and thrown off guard by them they made existent that which doesn't exist.
A legacy publisher, Tricycle Magazine, apologized in their own blog over nothing really. They made an honest mistake. Corporations do that on occasion. Group think carries the day.
"We don't need to worry about what would happen if there was an accident" some BP executive thought, is no different a construction than Tricycle's "We don't need to follow this many people."
It's the same stupidity and will always come back to bite you on the ass. The only difference is a matter of scale if you examine how a corporation functions.
I'm very pleased that you took refuge with Bardor Tulku Rinpoche and are my sister in the dharma.I'm not a very good older sibling in this regard.
I've been trampling alone through the woods for so many years I'm like a mountain man come out of the mist like an apparition to most people.
As Gigi likes to say, "Sometimes it's like you were raised by animals," I really don't care about so much that other people care very much about.
It's all causes and conditions which produce a particular result. There is no good or bad, right or wrong, in anything that appears to us. It's all just the luminous display of the mind.
We don't act like this, but instead choose to take way too much in our lives much more seriously than we should. There is nothing to be angry about. We don't need to go there.
Anger accomplishes nothing and does nothing but destroy our accumulation of merit necessary to remain in our present human form. When our merit is exhausted we die.
As I asked Gigi the other day, "Why get Angry over nothing?" It feels good for a moment perhaps but it gets old pretty quick.
The next thing you know your anger has taken over your whole life. After your little tiff over TIF with Gigi I thought you guys were going to come to blows.
I don't know what that was about. You definitely know much more about being angry than I do. I was ten years old the last time I allowed myself to get that angry.
Anyway, that was many summers ago. I hope you are enjoying this one more than those dark days we all go though in our lives. As Baso said, "Sun-faced Buddha, Moon-faced Buddha," it's all good.
Bill
Hi Bill – You love to see the response of anger in other people. It amuses you. That is all I am saying. THere are ways to use words respectfully that will not incite anger. There are ways to use words constructively too in ways that will incite anger.
"Me just being me isn't for everyone. I frame everything for disagreement. It drives Tyler Dewar crazy on Twitter how I twist everything to skewer its intended meaning."
You can be you all you want. But yes indeed you do frame everything for disagreement. For some people this is not pleasant. they are not "your" people I guess. Personally, I don't find dismissive comments to be respectful. Sometime issues are complex and they deserve a full discussion. Tthis is especially the case with public policy and government issues, such as teh example you mention. I just feel that I deserve a chance to have my say.
"This is the angle part of being a columnist for Elephant Journal. It's all sharp edges, and always leaves a mark. I know how to twist the knife. "
Enjoy the response then. This is not about me. This about you and your audience. Enjoy, I say. Enjoy.
Sally,
The only thing between you and having your say is your own anger.Go Blackhawks!
Bill